knowt logo

Positive Psychology: Potency of Positive Emotions

The Potency of Positive Emotions

Dr. Alice Isen

  • in experiencing mild positive emotions, we are more likely to

    • help other people

    • be flexible in our thinking

    • come up with solutions to our problems

Dr. Barbara Fredrickson

  • Broaden and Build Model

  • explain the social-cognitive effects of positive emotional experiences

    • Negative Emotions: physical reactions (fight/flight)

    • Positive Emotions: cognitive reactions

  • The experience of joy expands to the realm of what a person feels like doing at the time

    • the person who is happy listed more possibilities than a person who is in a negative state

  • joy (positive emotions) appears to open up to many new thought and behaviors

Theories of Happiness

Need-Goal Satisfaction Theories

  • Reduction of tension leads to happiness (psychoanalytic, humanist theories)

  • We are happy because we have reached our goals

  • Happiness as a target of our psychological pursuits

Process-Activity Theory

  • Engaging in particular life activities generate happiness

  • People who engage in FLOW in daily life tend to be happy

    • Flow: engagement in interesting activities that match or challenge task related skills

  • Engagement in activity produce happiness

  • Process of pursuing goals generate energy and happiness

Genetic-Personality Predisposition

  • Costa and McRae (1988)

  • biologically determined happiness

  • genetic-factors contribute to positive emotionality (40%) and negative emotionality (55%)

  • happiness dependent on temperament since individuals may vary in the type of adaptation to positive or negative external experiences

  • more research is needed to strengthen the connection between happiness and personality

Emotional Experiences

Emotion-Focused Coping

  • intense emotions were seen dysfunctional and opposed to rationality

  • linking with maladaptive outcomes in life

  • Stanton (1994) posits the potential of emotion-focused coping

  • Emotional approach involves active moving towards, rather than away, from a stressful encounter

  • Emotional Processing

    • attempts to understand emotions

    • Examples

      • I realize that my feelings are valid and important.

      • I take time to figure out what I am feeling.

      • I acknowledge my emotions.

  • Emotional Expression

    • free and intentional displays of feeling

    • Examples

      • I feel free to express my emotions.

      • I take time to express my emotions.

      • I let my feelings come out freely.

  • Benefits

    • most people benefit (short term) from expressing their emotions in a meaningful way

    • Emotional processing seem to be more adaptive as people learn more about what they feel and how they feel it

Emotional Intelligence

  • array of non-cognitive capabilities, competencies and skills that help us deal with the demands of the environment

  • measures personality and mood variables such as

    • self-regard, empathy, tolerance, happiness

  • “higher form of intelligence”

  • the ability to perceive and express emotions

  • to use emotions and emotional understanding to facilitate thinking

  • to understanding complex emotions, relationships among emotions and behavioral consequences

  • to manage emotions

Socioemotional Selectivity Theory

  • older adults are more able to

    • focus less on negative emotions

    • engage more deeply with emotional content

    • savor the positive in life

Emotional Storytelling

  • written disclosure of emotional upheaval

  • useful means to process intense negative emotions

Positive Cognitive States and Processes

Positive Thinking and Management

  • The positive thinking that usually comes with optimism is a key part of effective stress management and effective stress management is associated with many health benefits

Advantages of Positive Thinking

  • Research shows that people who feel confident in themselves can problem solve and make better decisions, take more risks, assert themselves and strive to meet their personal goals

  • Advantages of positive thinking include less stress, better overall physical and emotional health, longer life span, and better coping skills

Self-Efficacy

  • the belief that one’s skills and capabilities are enough to accomplish one’s desired goals in a specific situation

  • what I believe I can do with my skills under certain conditions

  • Learned Human Pattern

  • Social Cognition Theory: humans actively shape their lives rather than passively reacting to situations

  • S-E Components

    • performance accomplishment, vicarious learning, verbal encouragement, and emotional states

  • Performance Appraisal: previous successes in similar situations

  • Vicarious Learning: modeling on others in the same situations

  • Verbal Encouragement: undergoing verbal persuasion by a powerful, trustworthy expert (or an attractive person)

  • Emotional States: how level of arousal and state of emotion can be attached with the activity

Neurobiology of Self-Efficacy

  • Frontal and Pre-Frontal Lobes: facilitate prioritization of goals and the strategic thinking that is crucial for self-efficacy

  • Problem Solving: the right hemisphere reacts to the dilemmas as related by the linguistic left hemisphere

  • Realistic self-efficacy can lessen cardiac reactivity and lower blood pressure -- which facilitates coping

Measures of Self-Efficacy

  • Occupational Questionnaire (Teresa, 1991)

  • Career Counseling Self-Efficacy Scale (O’Brien & Heppner, 1997)

  • Hurricane Coping Self-Efficacy Survey

  • Cultural Self-Efficacy Scale (Briones et.al., 2009)

Influence of Self-Efficacy

  • building on successes through goal-setting and the incremental meeting of these goals

  • allowing the person to imagine himself/herself behaving effectively

  • teaching techniques for lowering arousal and to increase the likelihood of a more adaptive self-efficacious thinking

Positive Psychology: Potency of Positive Emotions

The Potency of Positive Emotions

Dr. Alice Isen

  • in experiencing mild positive emotions, we are more likely to

    • help other people

    • be flexible in our thinking

    • come up with solutions to our problems

Dr. Barbara Fredrickson

  • Broaden and Build Model

  • explain the social-cognitive effects of positive emotional experiences

    • Negative Emotions: physical reactions (fight/flight)

    • Positive Emotions: cognitive reactions

  • The experience of joy expands to the realm of what a person feels like doing at the time

    • the person who is happy listed more possibilities than a person who is in a negative state

  • joy (positive emotions) appears to open up to many new thought and behaviors

Theories of Happiness

Need-Goal Satisfaction Theories

  • Reduction of tension leads to happiness (psychoanalytic, humanist theories)

  • We are happy because we have reached our goals

  • Happiness as a target of our psychological pursuits

Process-Activity Theory

  • Engaging in particular life activities generate happiness

  • People who engage in FLOW in daily life tend to be happy

    • Flow: engagement in interesting activities that match or challenge task related skills

  • Engagement in activity produce happiness

  • Process of pursuing goals generate energy and happiness

Genetic-Personality Predisposition

  • Costa and McRae (1988)

  • biologically determined happiness

  • genetic-factors contribute to positive emotionality (40%) and negative emotionality (55%)

  • happiness dependent on temperament since individuals may vary in the type of adaptation to positive or negative external experiences

  • more research is needed to strengthen the connection between happiness and personality

Emotional Experiences

Emotion-Focused Coping

  • intense emotions were seen dysfunctional and opposed to rationality

  • linking with maladaptive outcomes in life

  • Stanton (1994) posits the potential of emotion-focused coping

  • Emotional approach involves active moving towards, rather than away, from a stressful encounter

  • Emotional Processing

    • attempts to understand emotions

    • Examples

      • I realize that my feelings are valid and important.

      • I take time to figure out what I am feeling.

      • I acknowledge my emotions.

  • Emotional Expression

    • free and intentional displays of feeling

    • Examples

      • I feel free to express my emotions.

      • I take time to express my emotions.

      • I let my feelings come out freely.

  • Benefits

    • most people benefit (short term) from expressing their emotions in a meaningful way

    • Emotional processing seem to be more adaptive as people learn more about what they feel and how they feel it

Emotional Intelligence

  • array of non-cognitive capabilities, competencies and skills that help us deal with the demands of the environment

  • measures personality and mood variables such as

    • self-regard, empathy, tolerance, happiness

  • “higher form of intelligence”

  • the ability to perceive and express emotions

  • to use emotions and emotional understanding to facilitate thinking

  • to understanding complex emotions, relationships among emotions and behavioral consequences

  • to manage emotions

Socioemotional Selectivity Theory

  • older adults are more able to

    • focus less on negative emotions

    • engage more deeply with emotional content

    • savor the positive in life

Emotional Storytelling

  • written disclosure of emotional upheaval

  • useful means to process intense negative emotions

Positive Cognitive States and Processes

Positive Thinking and Management

  • The positive thinking that usually comes with optimism is a key part of effective stress management and effective stress management is associated with many health benefits

Advantages of Positive Thinking

  • Research shows that people who feel confident in themselves can problem solve and make better decisions, take more risks, assert themselves and strive to meet their personal goals

  • Advantages of positive thinking include less stress, better overall physical and emotional health, longer life span, and better coping skills

Self-Efficacy

  • the belief that one’s skills and capabilities are enough to accomplish one’s desired goals in a specific situation

  • what I believe I can do with my skills under certain conditions

  • Learned Human Pattern

  • Social Cognition Theory: humans actively shape their lives rather than passively reacting to situations

  • S-E Components

    • performance accomplishment, vicarious learning, verbal encouragement, and emotional states

  • Performance Appraisal: previous successes in similar situations

  • Vicarious Learning: modeling on others in the same situations

  • Verbal Encouragement: undergoing verbal persuasion by a powerful, trustworthy expert (or an attractive person)

  • Emotional States: how level of arousal and state of emotion can be attached with the activity

Neurobiology of Self-Efficacy

  • Frontal and Pre-Frontal Lobes: facilitate prioritization of goals and the strategic thinking that is crucial for self-efficacy

  • Problem Solving: the right hemisphere reacts to the dilemmas as related by the linguistic left hemisphere

  • Realistic self-efficacy can lessen cardiac reactivity and lower blood pressure -- which facilitates coping

Measures of Self-Efficacy

  • Occupational Questionnaire (Teresa, 1991)

  • Career Counseling Self-Efficacy Scale (O’Brien & Heppner, 1997)

  • Hurricane Coping Self-Efficacy Survey

  • Cultural Self-Efficacy Scale (Briones et.al., 2009)

Influence of Self-Efficacy

  • building on successes through goal-setting and the incremental meeting of these goals

  • allowing the person to imagine himself/herself behaving effectively

  • teaching techniques for lowering arousal and to increase the likelihood of a more adaptive self-efficacious thinking

robot