Are you a glass half-empty or a glass half-full person? Depending on your answer you might be classified as an optimist or a pessimist.  But of course, many of us see a glass and think that it contains some liquid, never making a judgement about whether it is empty or full 😊 However, let’s go with the commonly accepted idiom for now… if you are a ‘glass half full’ person, you would be considered more optimistic and if you fall into the ‘glass half empty’ category, this would be an indicator of a more pessimistic outlook.  Categorizing people in this way is nothing new, we generally recognise optimistic or pessimistic tendencies in others, particularly when the perspective differs from our own. To those with an optimistic outlook, pessimists might seem to have a ‘downer’ on life, keen to find the negatives in every situation, whereas, those with a more pessimistic outlook might describe optimists as quixotic, perhaps even delusional?

Why is this important?  Are we simply one or the other and that’s that? According to Seligman (2006), a researcher whose original focus was on learned helplessness, this matters because our outlook informs our thoughts and, in turn, our actions. Whether we view things through an optimistic or pessimistic lens influences how we interpret setbacks, face challenges, and make decisions.  If we typically focus on negatives, we are likely to expect the worst outcome, so we might avoid taking risks. We are also more likely to see setbacks as personal failures and may overthink things, making choices more difficult.  In contrast, a more optimistic lens allows us to see the positives in a situation, feel confident, and be more hopeful about the future.

After recognising that some participants in his studies did not respond to stressful situations by showing signs of helplessness, (a trait usually associated with pessimism), Seligman began a quest to find out what it was that made people give up in the face of difficulties, when others demonstrated more resilience. His focus was on the words people chose to use when they explained events, which he termed explanatory style.  This term, not only referred to choice of words, but how these words affected thoughts and actions: ‘Your habitual way of explaining bad events, your explanatory style, is more than just the words you mouth when you fail.  It is a habit of thought, learned in childhood and adolescence… it is the hallmark of whether you are an optimist or a pessimist.’ (Ibid.:44).  

Explanatory style has three key elements:

• Permanance
• Pervasiveness
• Personalisation

People with a tendency to give up easily generally explain bad events as if they are permanent and use terms like ‘I will never  …’ , however, more positive events would be explained away as a one-off, for example, ‘I was just lucky …’

Pervasiveness describes whether or not an event is attributed to something specific or whether it is considered universal.  As Seligman says: ‘Some people can put their troubles neatly into a box and go about their lives even when one important aspect of it – their job, for example, or their love life – is suffering. Others bleed all over everything.’ (Seligman, 2006:46).  With a pessimistic explanatory style, the description of a negative event will be all-pervasive rather than focussed; ‘I won’t get that job’ might become ‘I will never get another job… so there is no point applying for one.’  This isn’t referring to a one-off event, it has become a predictor for the future.

An important aspect of explanatory style is Personalisation which relates to whether we blame ourselves when things go wrong (or take credit when they go well). We can personalise events as ‘our fault’ leading to a sense of not being ‘good enough’, or we externalise experiences and consider the wider factors which may have influenced the outcome.  For simplicity, this is summarised in table 1.

	Good Events	Bad Events
Pessimistic approach	Are temporary, quite specific and there probably due to external factors.	Are permanent, pervasive and personal – they reflect our shortcomings.
Optimistic approach	Are permanent and internal, due to skills and effort.	Are temporary and linked to specific factors and external influencers.

Taking a more optimistic approach has many benefits and according to Seligman, we can just as easily learn optimism as we can helplessness.  That’s quite a powerful thought isn’t it? 

Learned optimism starts with how we talk about events, which has an impact on how we think and feel about them, and finally on how we respond to them!  By using reflection in an objective way, we can focus on our language and thoughts, changing our explanatory style as well as the subsequent choices we make. However, it should be noted that this isn’t a form of magical thinking… we don’t change an event by sending thoughts out to the universe – we change it by adapting our response to it, which, of course is a response to how we think and feel.  It’s a virtuous circle.

If you are interested in your own tendencies towards optimism or pessimism, there are several online tests out there (just be wary … some of them ask you to pay a fee).  I tried a couple before writing this post and guess what?  I don’t fit neatly into either category, rather I was judged to be a ‘realist’… I am not surprised by that at all.  I am aware that there are times when I could be far more objective, could take credit for my positive actions, and could avoid blame when things don’t go well.  Still, I also recognise, quite objectively, that I am far from perfect … and that’s OK too.

References:

Seligman, M. (2006) Learned Optimism (2^nd edn). London: Nicholas Brealey Publishing.