Pollyanna principle

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The Pollyanna principle (also called Pollyannaism or positivity bias) is the tendency for people to remember pleasant items more accurately than unpleasant ones. [1] Research indicates that at the unconscious level, the mind tends to focus on the optimistic; while at the conscious level, it tends to focus on the negative. This unconscious bias is similar to the Barnum effect. [2]

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Poster for the 1920 film Pollyanna Pollyanna poster.jpg
Poster for the 1920 film Pollyanna

The name derives from the 1913 novel Pollyanna by Eleanor H. Porter describing a girl who plays the "glad game"—trying to find something to be glad about in every situation. The novel has been adapted to film several times, most famously in 1920 and 1960. An early use of the name "Pollyanna" in psychological literature was in 1969 by Boucher and Osgood who described a Pollyanna hypothesis as a universal human tendency to use positive words more frequently and diversely than negative words in communicating. [3] Empirical evidence for this tendency has been provided by computational analyses of large corpora of text. [4] [5]

The story of Pollyanna is about an orphaned little girl, who is sent to live with her Aunt Polly, who is known for being stiff, strict, and proper. When thrown into this environment, Pollyanna seeks to keep and spread her optimism to others. This beloved literary character's story shares the message that despite how hard things may seem, a sunny disposition can turn anyone and anything around.

Psychological research and findings

The Pollyanna principle was described by Margaret Matlin and David Stang in 1978 using the archetype of Pollyanna more specifically as a psychological principle which portrays the positive bias people have when thinking of the past. According to the Pollyanna principle, the brain processes information that is pleasing and agreeable in a more precise and exact manner as compared to unpleasant information. We actually tend to remember past experiences as more rosy than they actually occurred. The researchers found that people expose themselves to positive stimuli and avoid negative stimuli, they take longer to recognize what is unpleasant or threatening than what is pleasant and safe, and they report that they encounter positive stimuli more frequently than they actually do. Matlin and Stang also determined that selective recall was a more likely occurrence when recall was delayed: the longer the delay, the more selective recall that occurred. [6]

The Pollyanna principle has been observed on online social networks as well. For example, a series of studies by Emilio Ferrara, a computer scientist at the University of Southern California, found that Twitter users preferentially share more, and are emotionally affected more frequently by, positive information. [7] [8]

However, the only exception to the Pollyanna principle tends to be individuals suffering from depression or anxiety, who are more likely to either have more depressive realism or a negative bias. [9]

Positivity bias

Positivity bias is the part of the Pollyanna principle that attributes reasons to why people may choose positivity over negative or realistic mindsets. In positive psychology, it is broken down into three ideas: positive illusions, self deception, and optimism. [9] Having a positive bias increases with age, as it is more prevalent in adults approaching older adulthood than younger children or adolescents. [10] Older adults tend to pay attention to positive information, and this could be due to a specific focus in cognitive processing. In studies compiled by Andrew Reed and Laura Carstensen, they found that older adults (in comparison to younger adults) purposefully directed their attention away from negative material. [11]

Criticisms

Although the Pollyanna principle can be seen as helpful in some situations, some psychologists say it may inhibit an individual from coping effectively with life obstacles. [12] The Pollyanna principle in some instances can be known as "Pollyanna syndrome" and is defined by such skeptics as a person who is excessively positive and blind towards the negative or real. With regard to therapy or counseling, it is viewed as dangerous to both the therapist and patient. [13]

See also

Related Research Articles

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Actor–observer asymmetry is a bias one makes when forming attributions about the behavior of others or themselves. When people judge their own behavior, they are more likely to attribute their actions to the particular situation than to their personality. However, when an observer is explaining the behavior of another person, they are more likely to attribute this behavior to the actors' personality rather than to situational factors.

The positivity effect is the ability to constructively analyze a situation where the desired results are not achieved, but still obtain positive feedback that assists one's future progression.

The mere-exposure effect is a psychological phenomenon by which people tend to develop liking or disliking for things merely because they are familiar with them. In social psychology, this effect is sometimes called the familiarity principle. The effect has been demonstrated with many kinds of things, including words, Chinese characters, paintings, pictures of faces, geometric figures, and sounds. In studies of interpersonal attraction, the more often people see a person, the more pleasing and likeable they find that person.

The Barnum effect, also called the Forer effect or, less commonly, the Barnum–Forer effect, is a common psychological phenomenon whereby individuals give high accuracy ratings to descriptions of their personality that supposedly are tailored specifically to them, yet which are in fact vague and general enough to apply to a wide range of people. This effect can provide a partial explanation for the widespread acceptance of some paranormal beliefs and practices, such as astrology, fortune telling, aura reading, and some types of personality tests.

The implicit-association test (IAT) is an assessment intended to detect subconscious associations between mental representations of objects (concepts) in memory. Its best-known application is the assessment of implicit stereotypes held by test subjects, such as associations between particular racial categories and stereotypes about those groups. The test has been applied to a variety of belief associations, such as those involving racial groups, gender, sexuality, age, and religion but also the self-esteem, political views, and predictions of the test taker. The implicit-association test is the subject of significant academic and popular debate regarding its validity, reliability, and usefulness in assessing implicit bias.

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Socioemotional selectivity theory is a life-span theory of motivation. The theory maintains that as time horizons shrink, as they typically do with age, people become increasingly selective, investing greater resources in emotionally meaningful goals and activities. According to the theory, motivational shifts also influence cognitive processing. Aging is associated with a relative preference for positive over negative information in individuals who have had rewarding relationships. This selective narrowing of social interaction maximizes positive emotional experiences and minimizes emotional risks as individuals become older. According to this theory, older adults systematically hone their social networks so that available social partners satisfy their emotional needs.

The negativity bias, also known as the negativity effect, is a cognitive bias that, even when of equal intensity, things of a more negative nature have a greater effect on one's psychological state and processes than neutral or positive things. In other words, something very positive will generally have less of an impact on a person's behavior and cognition than something equally emotional but negative. The negativity bias has been investigated within many different domains, including the formation of impressions and general evaluations; attention, learning, and memory; and decision-making and risk considerations.

Positive illusions are unrealistically favorable attitudes that people have towards themselves or to people that are close to them. Positive illusions are a form of self-deception or self-enhancement that feel good; maintain self-esteem; or avoid discomfort, at least in the short term. There are three general forms: inflated assessment of one's own abilities, unrealistic optimism about the future, and an illusion of control. The term "positive illusions" originates in a 1988 paper by Taylor and Brown. "Taylor and Brown's (1988) model of mental health maintains that certain positive illusions are highly prevalent in normal thought and predictive of criteria traditionally associated with mental health."

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In social psychology, illusory superiority is a cognitive bias wherein a person overestimates their own qualities and abilities compared to other people. Illusory superiority is one of many positive illusions, relating to the self, that are evident in the study of intelligence, the effective performance of tasks and tests, and the possession of desirable personal characteristics and personality traits. Overestimation of abilities compared to an objective measure is known as the overconfidence effect.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Negative affectivity</span> Personality variable

Negative affectivity (NA), or negative affect, is a personality variable that involves the experience of negative emotions and poor self-concept. Negative affectivity subsumes a variety of negative emotions, including anger, contempt, disgust, guilt, fear, and nervousness. Low negative affectivity is characterized by frequent states of calmness and serenity, along with states of confidence, activeness, and great enthusiasm.

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The women-are-wonderful effect is the phenomenon found in psychological and sociological research which suggests that people associate more positive attributes with women when compared to men. This bias reflects an emotional bias toward women as a general case. The phrase was coined by Alice Eagly and Antonio Mladinic in 1994 after finding that both male and female participants tend to assign positive traits to women, with female participants showing a far more pronounced bias. Positive traits were assigned to men by participants of both genders, but to a far lesser degree.

In psychology, the positivity offset is a phenomenon where people tend to interpret neutral situations as mildly positive, and rate their lives as good, most of the time. The positivity offset stands in notable asymmetry to the negativity bias.

The fading affect bias, more commonly known as FAB, is a psychological phenomenon in which memories associated with negative emotions tend to be forgotten more quickly than those associated with positive emotions. It is important to note that FAB only refers to the feelings one has associated with the memories and not the content of the memories themselves. Early research studied FAB retrospectively, or through personal reflection, which brought about some criticism because retrospective analysis can be affected by subjective retrospective biases. However, new research using non-retrospective recall studies have found evidence for FAB., and the phenomenon has become largely accepted.

Kindness priming is an affect-dependent cognitive effect in which subjects will display a positive affect following exposure to kindness.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Optimism</span> Positive mental attitude

Optimism is an attitude reflecting a belief or hope that the outcome of some specific endeavor, or outcomes in general, will be positive, favorable, and desirable. A common idiom used to illustrate optimism versus pessimism is a glass filled with water to the halfway point: an optimist is said to see the glass as half full, while a pessimist sees the glass as half empty.

References

  1. Matlin & Stang 1978, p. 260.
  2. Forer 1949.
  3. Boucher & Osgood 1969.
  4. Dodds et al. 2015.
  5. Holtz, Deutschmann & Dobewall 2017.
  6. Matlin & Stang 1978.
  7. Ferrara & Yang 2015a.
  8. Ferrara & Yang 2015b.
  9. 1 2 Carr 2004.
  10. Ackerman, C. E. (20 August 2018). "Pollyanna principle: The psychology of positivity bias" . Retrieved March 10, 2021.
  11. Reed, A. E.; Carstensen, L. L. (2012). "The theory behind the age-related positivity effect". Frontiers in Psychology. 339.
  12. "Pollyanna principle: The ability to focus only on the positive". September 5, 2020. Retrieved March 10, 2021.
  13. Latecki, B. (2017). "Pollyanna syndrome in psychotherapy-or pseudotherapy. counseling, consoling or counterfeiting?". European Psychiatry. 41: S777–S778. doi:10.1016/j.eurpsy.2017.01.1474. S2CID   148849363.

Bibliography