What comes first: the optimism or the good health?
Optimism, defined as the general expectation that the future will be favorable, could provide ways to improve health, some researchers believe. But scientists remain unsure if optimism goes ahead of health improvements, or vice versa.
A recent study suggests that most people can't help but to think optimistically. This study was conducted by Ed O'Brien, a social psychologist at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. The findings suggest that people have a natural tendency to think positively about their future.
Participants were asked to create a list of imaginary personal experiences that would make them happy or unhappy over the course of the next year. They then ranked how difficult it was to plan that list and how happy they believed they would be in the future overall. The easier it was for people to think of positive future experiences, the happier they imagined they would be. However, there was no relationship between easily developing negative future experiences and expecting to be unhappy as a result.
O'Brien concluded that people seem to discount the possibility that future negative events will make them happy overall, suggesting that optimism might come more naturally. "We're not as used to thinking about the future in terms of things that are going to go wrong." O'Brien's study is one of many to find that people are consistently optimistic about their future, predicting pleasant experiences and discounting unpleasant ones. If optimism may lead to better health and people generally tend to think optimistically, what does this mean for the connection between mental and physical health? "If we can make sure that optimism comes before healthy states, we might be able to involve and improve people's optimism," Boehm explained. However, it's difficult to determine what comes first: the optimism or the good health.
