Fear may contribute to the ideal of informed voting by enhancing detailed processing (Tiedens & Linton, 2001), whereas anger may detract from this ideal by promoting less careful processing and reliance on heuristics (Bodenhausen, Sheppard, & Kramer, 1994). Consistent with this possibility, work in political science (e.g., Marcus, Neuman, & MacKuen, 2000; Valentino et al., 2008) suggests that anxiety (fear) motivates citizens to learn, which may lead them to become better informed voters. … We … test[ed] the prediction that fear would lead participants to use specific issue-based information when choosing a candidate, whereas anger would lead participants to rely on general criteria (e.g., party loyalty). (more; HT Barker)

Yet fear of (thinking about) death seems quite effective at preventing critical thinking. Is fear of death different?