The Benefits of Optimism on Health

Paper Summary:

This paper presents research studies that show that people who are optimistic will feel better about themselves and the world around them; which in turn correlates to better health. The author continues to review the five mechanisms by which optimism might promote good health. There is also a case study on the correlation of good health to two of the mechanisms (Larsen & Buss, 2008).

From the Paper:

"Optimists tend to have external, unstable and specific explanations for the bad events that they undergo. In other words, the optimist understands that the situation could not have been avoided, and does not apply the "misfortune" to account of other flaws or mishaps in his life. Pessimists, however, tend to blame unfortunate events on internal, stable and global explanations. Optimism and pessimism are now seen as traits that people possess as parts of their personality on which they differ. Optimists do not believe that they influence the events in their lives, but rather the outcomes to the events; pessimists tend to assume a helpless attitude, believing that bad events will have long lasting effects on many aspects of their lives (Larsen & Buss, 2008).
"In the realm of psychology, there are four main definitions outlined in the text of what optimism actually is, but only three will be discussed here. We already established that according to the attributional style, "...the optimism construct...refers to the explanatory style for bad events being to blame on stable, global, and internal causes." The term dispositional optimism has been offered by Scheier and Carver, and basically says that optimists believe that they will have success in more areas of their life than they will not have success in. Self-efficacy, another form of optimism, is the belief that one can achieve a desired outcome by simply performing the acts necessary for the results (Larsen & Buss, 2008)."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Larsen, Randy J. and Buss, David M. (2008). Personality Psychology: Domains of Knowledge About Human Nature. New York, New York: McGraw-Hill.
• Scheier, Michael F., Weintraub, Jagdish K. and Carver, Charles S. (1986). Coping with Stress: Divergent strategies of optimists and pessimists. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 51(6), 1257-1264.

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