Image source: Flickr user Fiduz via kuriositas
In a SundayReview piece on the NY Times today, NYU psychologist, Gabriele Oettingen discusses the downsides of positive thinking. She and her colleagues have found across several studies that positive thinking leads to a feel of having already attained the desired outcome, which leads to less energy, and less motivation available for actually attaining the goal. This, in turns, leads to a lower probability of success. Oettingen recommends a sort of moderate thinking approach called "mental contrasting": "[t]hink of a wish. For a few minutes, imagine the wish coming true, letting your mind wander and drift where it will. Then shift gears. Spend a few more minutes imagining the obstacles that stand in the way of realizing your wish." This approach leads to more success than when people focus only on the fantasy of achieving the positive outcome or only on all the things that could go wrong along the way. Interestingly, mental contrasting can also help people abandon unrealistic ambitions in favor of more "realistic" pursuits.
The article doesn't distinguish between positive thinking and wishful thinking. It's possible that one may be more helpful than the other, but presumably the author is thinking of both pursuits that are and are not actually attainable. I also wonder how positive thinking, as defined by Oettingen, interacts with beliefs about luck (i.e., do people who attribute success to luck or external processes suffer less from the pitfalls of positive thinking?). This article also lends support to the lay-theory that imagining a positive outcome or vocalizing a hope that you attain something can jinx the whole affair and actually make it less likely to come true.
The article doesn't distinguish between positive thinking and wishful thinking. It's possible that one may be more helpful than the other, but presumably the author is thinking of both pursuits that are and are not actually attainable. I also wonder how positive thinking, as defined by Oettingen, interacts with beliefs about luck (i.e., do people who attribute success to luck or external processes suffer less from the pitfalls of positive thinking?). This article also lends support to the lay-theory that imagining a positive outcome or vocalizing a hope that you attain something can jinx the whole affair and actually make it less likely to come true.
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