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Key points
- The three primary factors that separate optimists from pessimists are permanence, pervasiveness and personal blame, according to research.
- Pessimists often see change as permanent, expect changes to have pervasive effects on their lives and blame themselves when things turn bad.
- Most people are not purely optimistic nor pessimistic. Research suggests they can also change their way of looking at the world.
How many of you are optimistic about the future? I am becoming increasingly so. I believe in this country we are at a point where a number of things may change for the better. So I would encourage you to consider whether you are an optimist or a pessimist.
Psychologists have studied optimism for many years, and psychologist Martin Seligman identified, after 25 years of research, three of the primary factors that separate optimists from pessimists. They are permanence, pervasiveness and personal blame. The 3P's.
1. Permanence
Seligman found in his research that pessimists were more likely to view change as being permanent rather than temporary. Optimists on the other hand were more likely to see change as temporary. In other words, if things went well for a while, pessimists were more likely to assume that they would continue to go well and were pretty upset when things didn't go well. On the other hand, optimists enjoyed the good times, but also assumed that there would be bad times — that this would not be a permanent state of affairs. When things got bad, the optimists assumed that "this too will pass." The pessimists, on the other hand, assumed that things were bad and would stay bad.
2. Pervasiveness
The second factor is pervasiveness. Pessimists assume that if something good or bad happened that it would have a pervasive effect on their life. It would make everything different. If they didn't get that job and that promotion, all was lost. If they got the job or the promotion, everything was going to be good. Of course, this is not the way things work usually. Optimists, on the other hand, assumed that changes that occurred would affect their life in a specific way but usually not a pervasive way. Not everything would change for the good or the bad.
3. Personal Blame
The third factor is personal blame. Pessimists assume that there is someone to be blamed if things go badly. Unfortunately, in many cases, they assume that they need to blame themselves. Obviously, this is not a good way to look at things. Blame is accountability but with a heavy dose of emotion. Optimists and pessimists need to hold themselves and others accountable for what they do, but they do not need to spend the extra energy and emotion on blaming themselves or others.
Most of us are neither purely optimistic nor purely pessimistic. We are a mix of both. It might be useful to look at where you are in terms of these three factors. If you are more on the pessimistic side, you may want to make some changes. Seligman, in his research, proved that people can change and that people can develop a more optimistic way of looking at the world. This is especially true in what we teach our children. It is called explanatory style. How we explain things to them will determine to a large degree whether they develop a pessimistic or an optimistic outlook on the world. Obviously what we say to our children matters a great deal.
So give some thought to this and specifically give some thought to how you explain your view of the world and events in the world to your children. It will have a major impact on them and the way they view the world in the future.
