POSITIVE PSYCHOLOGY:Criticisms of â€˜Traditionalâ€™ Psychology, Optimism

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Organizational Psychology (PSY510)

LESSON 23

POSITIVE PSYCHOLOGY

The field of Positive Psychology has originated from Humanistic Psychology. It may generally be defined as

the scientific study of human happiness. The history of psychology as a science shows that the field has

been primarily dedicated to addressing mental illness rather than mental wellness. Its research programs and

application models have dealt mainly with how people are wrong rather than how they are right. The need

to correct this bias was anticipated in psychological writings as early as those of the American psychologist

and philosopher William James. In his 1902 book, The Varieties of Religious Experience, James argues that

happiness is a chief concern of human life and those who pursue it should be regarded as "healthy-minded."

Several humanistic psychologists--such as Abraham Maslow, Carl Rogers, and Erich Fromm--developed

successful theories and practices that involved human happiness despite there being a lack of solid empirical

evidence behind their work. However, it is the pioneering research of Martin Seligman, Ed Diener, Mihaly

Csikszentmihalyi, Christopher Peterson, Don Clifton, and many others that promises to put the study of

human happiness onto a firms scientific foundation and add some positivity to the predominantly negative

discipline of psychology.

Positive psychology is a new and rapidly expanding field focused on the empirical study of human

flourishing. One of its central missions is the development of an operationalzed classification of the

strengths and virtues that constitute character. The aim is to foster the identification, measurement, and

cultivation of these strengths and virtues.

It may be considered as the scientific pursuit of optimal human functioning and the building of a field

focusing on human strength and virtue. It builds on the bench science and research methods that shed light

on the "dark side" of human functioning, and it opens the door to understanding prevention and health

promotion. Dr. Seligman (1998) noted:

"We have discovered that there is a set of human strengths that are the most likely buffers against mental

illness: courage, optimism, interpersonal skill, work ethic, hope, honesty and perseverance. Much of the task

of prevention will be to create a science of human strength whose mission will be to foster these virtues in

young people."

Criticisms of `Traditional' Psychology

The following is a list of some of the main criticisms Seligman and others advance against traditional,

empirical psychology:

· Traditional psychology has an underlying negative bias whereby it assumes that human beings are

largely motivated by negative emotions such as jealousy or by self-serving ends. For example,

according to such a view, Princess Diana did not campaign against land mines because she wanted

to end human suffering but because she was narcissistic or motivated by rage against the

Royal Family.

· Psychologists have operated within a disease model and have therefore spent time researching

everything which could go wrong with the human brain and personality. This means they have

spent little time defining positive human traits such as altruism or kindness. Largely as a result of

psychologists' bias, people in western society as a whole have lost the capacity to think in terms of

virtue or good character.

· Psychologists have spent much more time studying negative emotions such as anger or depression

rather than positive emotions such as happiness or joy.

· Psychology's emphasis on the negative side of life means it is, in Seligman's terminology, `half-

baked' as it does not adequately look at the whole range of human experience.

· Psychology has focused on identifying and fixing weaknesses rather than identifying and building

on people's strengths.

· Traditional psychology renders individuals passive victims of things which happen to them in life.

It does not tend to see them as being masters of their own fate or in control of their emotions.

Positive Psychology has the following characteristics:

· It is interested in what has been termed `the science of optimal human functioning'.

· It wants to learn what works from studying human success rather than human failure or

weaknesses.

Organizational Psychology (PSY510)

It focuses attention on positive subjective experiences such as happiness and well-being as well as

positive human characteristics such as strengths and virtues.

· It is not just interested in individuals but in how group structures such as organisations, families or

cultures can induce positive emotion and encourage the use of strengths.

Positive Psychology concerns with:

1. Optimism

2. Hope

3. Emotional Intelligence

4. Self Efficacy

5. Subjective Well-being (SWB)

Optimism

Optimism is the extent to which a person sees life in positive or negative terms. A popular expression used

to convey this idea concerns the glass half filled with water. A person with a lot of optimism will tend to see

it as half full, whereas a person with les optimism (a pessimist) will often see it as half empty. Optimism is

also related to positive and negative affectivity. In general, optimistic people tend to handle stress better.

They will be able to see the positive characteristics of the situation and recognize that things may eventually

improve. In contrast, les optimistic people may focus more on the negative characteristics of the situation

and expect things to get worse, not better.

It may be defined as an outlook on life such that one maintains a view of the world as a positive place. It is

the opposite of pessimism. Optimists generally believe that people and events are inherently good, so that

most situations work out in the end for the best.

Martin Seligman, in researching this area, criticizes academics for focusing too much on causes for

pessimism and not enough on optimism. He points out that in the last three decades of the 20th century

journals published 46,000 psychological papers on depression and only 400 on joy.

Optimism has been shown to be correlated with better immune systems in healthy people who have been

subjected to stress.

Optimism also has its drawbacks, for example, in organizations optimistic managers may become distracted

from making necessary action plans to attain goals.

Martin Seligman and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, describe positive psychology as: Well being, content,

satisfaction, capacity for love, courage, sensibility, forgiveness, responsibility, tolerance and work ethic.

A useful definition of optimism was offered by anthropologist Lionel Tiger (1979): "a mood or attitude

associated with an expectation about the social or material future--one which the evaluator regards as

socially desirable, to his/her advantage or pleasure". An important implication of this definition, one drawn

out by Tiger, is that there can be no single or objective optimism, at least as characterized by its content,

because what is considered optimism depends on what the individual regards as desirable. Optimism is

predicated on evaluation--on given affects and emotions, as it were.

Contemporary approaches usually treat optimism as a cognitive characteristic--a goal, an expectation, or a

causal attribution--which is sensible so long as we remember that the belief in question concerns future

occurrences about which individuals have strong feelings. Optimism is not simply cold cognition, and if we

forget the emotional flavor that pervades optimism, we can make little sense of the fact that optimism is

both motivated and motivating. Indeed, people may well need to feel optimistic about matters.

Along these lines, we can ask whether people can be generically optimistic, that is, hopeful without specific

expectations. Although at odds with conventional definitions, the possibility of free-floating optimism

deserves scrutiny. Some people readily describe themselves as optimistic yet fail to endorse expectations

consistent with this view. This phenomenon may merely be a style of self-presentation, but it may

additionally reflect the emotional and motivational aspects of optimism without any of the cognitive

aspects. Perhaps extraversion is related to this cognitively shorn version of optimism.

Dimensions of Optimism

o Earlier, optimism was considered to be only an illusion which was not a part of human nature. It was

only a way to avoid the realistic view of things. With the development of the science of Positive

Psychology, optimism was considered as an imperative part of healthy human psychology. Discussions

of optimism take two forms. In the first, it is posited to be an inherent part of human nature, to be

either praised or decried. Early approaches to optimism as human nature were decidedly negative.

Organizational Psychology (PSY510)

Writers as diverse as Sophocles and Nietzsche argued that optimism prolongs human suffering: It is

better to face the hard facts of reality. This negative view of positive thinking lies at the heart of Freud's

influential writings on the subject. Freud proposed that optimism is part of human nature but only as a

derivative of the conflict between instincts and socialization. He thought some individuals--Freud

mentioned the educated and in particular neurologists--did not need the illusion of optimism. Similar

statements were offered by the entire gamut of influential psychologists and psychiatrists from the

1930s through the 1960s: Allport, Erikson, Fromm, Maslow, Menninger, and Rogers, among many

others (see Snyder, 1988, and Taylor, 1989, for thorough reviews).

Matters began to change in the 1960s and 1970s in light of research evidence showing that most people

are not strictly realistic or accurate in how they think. Cognitive psychologists documented an array of

shortcuts that people take as they process information. Margaret Matlin and David Stang (1978)

surveyed hundreds of studies showing that language, memory, and thought are selectively positive. For

example, people use more positive words than negative words, whether speaking or writing. In free

recall, people produce positive memories sooner than negative ones. Most people evaluate themselves

positively, and in particular more positively than they evaluate others. Apparently, in our minds, we are

all children of Lake Wobegon, all of whom are above average.

o Another dimension of optimism stems for learned helplessness which is the tendency to consider one

helpless against different things. One third humans do not become helpless, so they are optimists.

o Pessimistic make internal (their own fault), stable (permanent) and global (will undermine everything

they do) attributions

o Optimists make external (not my) unstable (temporary) specific (situational) attributions'

o Optimism may vary in different people. At the same time optimism as human nature was being

discussed in positive terms by theorists like Lazarus, Beck, Taylor, and Tiger, other psychologists who

were interested in individual differences began to address optimism as a characteristic people possess to

varying degrees. These two approaches are compatible. Our human nature provides a baseline

optimism, of which individuals show more versus less: "In dealing with natural systems the shortest

analytical distance between two points is a normal curve". Our experiences influence the degree to

which we are optimistic or pessimistic.

o Social learning/modeling can create optimism

Optimism in Workplace

Optimism in Workplace is a Motive and a Motivator

· Optimists

o Work harder

o Persevere

o Are healthy

o Have high morale

o Have high levels of aspiration

o Better sales people

They suffer less anxiety and depression. Pessimists tend to see bad events as inevitable, as some permanent

reflection of the environment or themselves. Optimists, on the other hand, tend to see bad situations as

temporary and specific -- something they can address. They can take responsibility for their own poor

behavior. They will not, however, blame themselves as a whole. Pessimists, in fact, can be more "realistic"

about their flaws. Optimists function effectively with even a slightly enhanced view of themselves. Not

arrogance or delusion, just a polished reality.

Optimism also helps the healthy population deal with stressors. A study of first-year law students, for

instance, found optimists with a higher level of self-acceptance and more confidence about their

achievements. They started school with the same level of immunity as the pessimists. By the end of the year,

however, the optimists had higher levels of helper T cells and natural killer-cell cytotoxicity-- that is, an

ability to kill cancer cells.

Various optimism scales have been developed to measure the level of optimism in people.

REFERENCES

· Mejia, Gomez. Balkin, David & Cardy, Rober. (2006). Managing Human Resources (Fourth Edition).

India: Dorling Kidersley Pvt. Ltd., licensee of Pearson Education in South Asia.

Organizational Psychology (PSY510)

Luthans, Fred. (2005). Organizational Behaviour (Tenth Edition). United States: McGraw Hill Irwin.

Positive psychology readings: http://www.ppc.sas.upenn.edu/publications.htm

Argyle, Michael (2001). The Psychology of Happiness. Routledge: http://www.answers.com/topic/michael-

argyle-psychologist

Gilbert, Daniel (2006). Stumbling on Happiness. Knopf.: http://www.answers.com/topic/daniel-gilbert-

psychologist

Haidt, Jonathan (2005). The Happiness Hypothesis. Basic Books.

Peterson, Christopher and Seligman, Martin (2004). Character Strengths and Virtues: A Handbook and

Classification. Oxford University Press.

FUTHER READING

Positive Psychology: An Introduction, Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi, 2000:

http://www.ppc.sas.upenn.edu/ppintroarticle.pdf

Positive Psychology Progress: Empirical Validation of Interventions, Seligman, Steen, Park, & Peterson,

2005: http://www.ppc.sas.upenn.edu/ppprogressarticle.pdf

What (and Why) Is Positive Psychology?, Gable and Haidt, 2005:

http://faculty.virginia.edu/haidtlab/articles/gable.haidt.what-is-positive-psychology.pdf

A Balanced Psychology and a Full Life, Seligman, Parks, & Steen, 2004:

http://www.ppc.sas.upenn.edu/balancedpsychologyarticle.pdf

Positive Psychology in Clinical Practice, Duckworth, Steen, & Seligman, 2005:

http://www.ppc.sas.upenn.edu/ppclinicalpractice.pdf

Positive Psychotherapy, Seligman, Rashid, & Parks, 2006:

http://www.ppc.sas.upenn.edu/positivepsychotherapyarticle.pdf

Optimism: http://www.eqtoday.com/optimism/seligman.html

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