How Dispositional Optimists and Pessimists Evaluate their Past, Present and Anticipated Future Life Satisfaction: A Lifespan Approach

Abstract

Dispositional optimism is typically conceptualized with respect to generalized positive expectancies for personal future outcomes. The present work draws on lifespan development theory to evaluate how dispositional optimists and pessimists from across the lifespan evaluate their past, present and anticipated future life satisfaction (LS). Using data from an American probability sample (n = 3871, ages = 30–84 years, 55% female), I compared dispositional optimists and pessimists across six age decades. Subjective LS trajectories reflected in mean trends in ratings of past, present and future LS were contoured by lifestage, revealing inclining trajectories among young dispositional optimists and pessimists and declining trajectories among older optimists and pessimists. After adjusting for age‐specific normative trends, however, differences between dispositional optimists and pessimists in subjective LS trajectories were consistent across lifestage, revealing a single dissociative pattern wherein optimists rated their past, present and anticipated future LS more positively than did pessimists. Of the three temporal perspectives, evaluations of present (rather than past or future) LS were most consistently related to dispositional optimism. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Do (Even) Depressed Individuals Believe That Life Gets Better and Better? The Link Between Depression and Subjective Trajectories for Life Satisfaction

“…Our findings, therefore, may be limited to the developmental life stages between early and middle adulthood, particularly given that declining (rather than inclining) subjective LS trajectories are common among older adults (Busseri, 2013). Furthermore, although a random-sampling procedure was used to select the baseline sample, because of the attrition between Wave 1 and Wave 2, our results will not necessarily generalize to the broader American population from which MIDUS participants were drawn.…”

“…If so, the brighter future envisioned by depressed individuals may in fact be perceived as a burdensome obligation or a comparison standard against which they feel they are chronically failing and the attainment of which is deemed to be beyond one's ability (Klenk et al, 2011;Strauman, 1989). Although it may seem counterintuitive to interpret an inclining subjective trajectory as a sign of hopelessness, in nonclinical samples, steeper upward trajectories are, in fact, linked with lower levels of dispositional hope (Choma et al, 2014) and greater dispositional pessimism (Busseri, 2013;Busseri et al, 2009b;Busseri et al, 2013), which is itself strongly linked with hopelessness (Beck, Weissman, Lester, & Trexler, 1974). Thus, among depressed individuals, visions of a much improved personal future may be a form of escapism (Marroquin, Nolen-Hoeksema, & Miranda, 2013) or wishful thinking (Busseri et al, 2009a) rather than a reflection of one's confidence in achieving a more satisfying future.…”

Education and Life Satisfaction in Relation to the Probability of Social Trust: a Conceptual Framework and Empirical Analysis

“…Following the idea of Brehm and Rahn (1997), Schwartz and Clore (1983) theorised that people are more trusting when they think that their lives are going well (see also Van Deth et al 1999 These latter studies suggest that there should be high levels of social trust in a society when most of its members are satisfied with their lives. Furthermore, it is likely that optimists have positive life evaluations (see also Strassle et al 1999;Busseri 2012;Busseri et al 2013;Dumitrache et al 2015;Caprara et al 2016); thus, we expect that optimists are more likely to trust strangers than are people who are dissatisfied with lives. The positive relationship between life satisfaction and social trust (in both directions) plausibly reflects a correlation rather than a causal relationship.…”

Optimistic Explanatory Style and Suicide Attempt in Young Adults

“…Just as individuals who think positively about their future appear to be protected from some adverse medical and psychological outcomes (Achat et al 2000; Vaillant 2003;Hirsch et al 2007aHirsch et al , 2007b, so might individuals who are able think positively about their past Hirsch et al 2009;Busseri 2013). Preliminary findings suggest that teaching individuals to develop a more balanced and optimistic set of attributions for past negative life events can increase hopefulness and reduce depression in adolescents and college students (Jaycox et al 1994;Gillham et al 2001;Gillham and Reivich 2004); our results suggest that this treatment strategy may also be beneficial to suicidal individuals.…”