Is the future always brighter than the past? Anticipation of changes in the personal future after recall of past experiences

Abstract

People tend to hold an optimistic view of their futures. Using a novel paradigm to examine the anticipated change from the personal past to the personal future, we found that the future was not always perceived as brighter than the past. College students (N = 156) recalled positive and negative personal events of various situations. Following each recall, they imagined a future personal event involving the same situation. Participants expected over half of the events to change in either upward or downward directions, depending on the valence of the past events. In addition, participants anticipated greater changes in domains of less stability, and Asians anticipated greater changes than European Americans. Anticipated future changes were further associated with psychological well-being. The findings shed new light on future event simulation.

How will things be the next time? Self in the construction of future events among school-aged children

“…Consistent with adult findings (Wang et al, 2015), we expected that children who anticipated greater upward changes and smaller downward changes would exhibit greater self-worth.…”

“…The shift of affective valence in the future event was then observed. We expected that consistent with adult data (Wang et al, 2015), a considerable percentage of children would anticipate changes from the past to the future in either upward or downward directions, depending on the valence of their past experiences.…”

“…(Caruso, Gilbert, & Wilson, 2008;D'Argembeau & Van der Linden, 2006;Newby-Clark & Ross, 2003). A recent study by Wang and colleagues (Wang, Gould, & Hou, 2015) directly examined how people perceived change from the past to the future in future event simulation. College students were asked to recall positive and negative personal events of various situations (e.g., doing well on a school assignment).…”

“…This task was adapted from previous studies of past and future event constructions in children (Wang et al, 2014) and of perceived past-to-future changes in adults (Wang et al, 2015). The interviewer first interacted with children to establish rapport.…”

“…We adopted the paradigm developed by Wang et al (2015): children first recalled a positive or negative personal event involving either peers or academic performance. They were then asked to imagine a future personal event involving the same situation.…”