"positive illusions" promote psychological well-being?”
It is well - known that a plethora of prominent theorists have argued that accurate perceptions of the self, the world, and the future are essential for mental health. For instance, Maslow (1950) stated:
“Our healthy individuals find it possible to accept themselves and their own nature without chagrin or complaint.... They can accept their own human nature with all of its discrepancies from the ideal image without feeling real concern. It would convey the wrong impression to say that they are self-satisfied. What we must rather say is that they can take the frailties and sins, weaknesses and evils of human nature in the same unquestioning spirit that one takes or accepts the characteristics of nature” (p. 54).
Reviewing a large number of theories of the healthy personality, Jourard and Landsman (1980) noted, "The ability to perceive reality as it 'really is' is fundamental to effective functioning. It is considered one of the two preconditions to the development of [the healthy personality]" (p. 75).
To summarize, then, the view that psychological health depends on accurate perceptions of reality has been widely promulgated and widely shared in the literature on mental health.
For years then, the common wisdom in psychological research and popular consciousness as well has treated contact with reality as a hallmark of mental health. According to this view, the well-adjusted person is thought to engage in accurate reality testing, whereas the individual whose vision is clouded by illusion is regarded as vulnerable to, if not already a victim of, mental illness.
Whilst it is intuitevely plausible, the said viewpoint becomes increasingly untenable (cf. Lazarus, 1983 ). A considerable body of research testifies to the prevalence of illusion in normal human cognition (see Fiske & Taylor, 1984 ; Greenwald, 1980 ; Nisbett & Ross, 1980; Sackeim, 1983 ; Taylor, 1983 ).
Moreover, these illusions often involve central aspects of the self and the environment so that they by any means cannot be dismissed as inconsequential.
In the conventional view, the subject monitors and interacts with the world much like a naive scientist (see Fischhoff, 1976 ; Fiske & Taylor, 1984 ; Nisbett & Ross, 1980 , for discussions). According to this view, the person gathers data in an unbiased manner; combines it in some logical, identifiable fashion; and reaches generally good, accurate inferences and decisions. Theories of the causal attribution process (e.g., Kelley, 1967 ), prediction (see Kahneman & Tversky, 1973 ), judgments of covariation, and other tasks of social inference (see Fiske & Taylor, 1984 ; Nisbett & Ross, 1980 ) incorporated the assumptions of the naive scientist as normative guidelines with which actual behavior could be compared.
Then, however, it became apparent that the actual inferential and decision making processes looked little like these normative models. Rather, information processing is full of incomplete data gathering, shortcuts, errors, and biases (see Fiske & Taylor, 1984 ; Nisbett & Ross, 1980). In particular, prior expectations and self-serving interpretations weigh heavily into the social judgment process. In summarizing this work, Fiske and Taylor (1984) noted, "Instead of a naive scientist entering the environment in search of the truth, we find the rather unflattering picture of a charlatan trying to make the data come out in a manner most advantageous to his or her already-held theories" (p. 88).
Thus, a question arises what function those illusions fulfill. Can their virtually universal presence be reconciled with the aforementioned conventional view of psychological well-being?
Indeed, some research suggests that at least certain illusions may be adaptive for mental health and well-being. In particular, there is evidence that a set of interrelated positive illusions–namely, unrealistically positive self-evaluations, exaggerated perceptions of control or mastery, and unrealistic optimism–can serve a wide variety of cognitive, affective, and social functions.
It has been shown that there exists a pervasive tendency to see the self as better than others. Individuals judge positive personality attributes to be more descriptive of themselves than of the average person but see negative personality attributes as less descriptive of themselves than of the average person ( Alicke, 1985; Brown, 1986). This effect has been documented for a wide range of traits ( Brown, 1986) and abilities (Campbell, 1986 ; Larwood & Whittaker, 1977); individuals even believe that their driving ability is superior to others' ( Svenson, 1981). If only because it is logically impossible for most people to be better than the average person, these highly skewed, positive views of the self can be regarded as evidence for their unrealistic and illusory nature. People also tend to use their positive qualities when appraising others, thereby virtually assuring a favorable self-other comparison ( Lewicki, 1983 ). And people give others less credit for success and more blame for failure than they ascribe to themselves ( Forsyth & Schlenker, 1977; Green & Gross, 1979; Mirels, 1980; Schlenker & Miller, 1977; Taylor & Koivumaki, 1976).
A second source of evidence pertaining to the illusory quality of positive self-perceptions comes from investigations in which self-ratings have been compared with judgments made by observers. Lewinsohn, Mischel, Chaplin, and Barton (1980) had observers watch college-student subjects complete a group-interaction task. Observers then rated each subject along a number of personality dimensions (e.g., friendly, warm, and assertive). Subjects also rated themselves on each attribute. The results showed that self-ratings were significantly more positive than the observers' ratings. In other words, individuals saw themselves in more flattering terms than they were seen in by others.
In sum, the perception of self that most individuals hold is not as well-balanced as traditional models of mental health maintain. Rather than being attentive to both the favorable and unfavorable aspects of self, normal individuals appear to be very cognizant of their strengths and assets and considerably less aware of their weaknesses and faults. Evidence that these flattering self-portrayals are illusory comes from studies in which researchers have found that (a) most individuals see themselves as better than the average person and (b) most individuals see themselves as better than others see them. For these reasons, overly positive views of the self appear to be illusory.
As to individuals who perceive both the good and the bad aspects of themselves as many views of mental health maintain the normal person is or should be, Suggestive evidence indicates that individuals who are low in self-esteem, moderately depressed, or both are more balanced in self-perceptions (see Coyne & Gotlieb, 1983; Ruehlman, West, & Pasahow, 1985; Watson & Clark, 1984). These individuals tend to (a) recall positive and negative self-relevant information with equal frequency (e.g., Kuiper & Derry, 1982 ; Kuiper & MacDonald, 1982 ), (b) show greater evenhandedness in their attributions of responsibility for outcomes of action (e.g., Campbell & Fairey, 1985 ; Kuiper, 1978 ; Rizley, 1978 ), (c) display greater congruence between self-evaluations and evaluations of others (e.g., Brown, 1986 ), and (d) offer self-appraisals that coincide more closely with appraisals by objective observers (e.g., Lewinsohn et al., 1980 ). In other words, according to this body of evidence, it appears to be not the well-adjusted individual but the individual who experiences subjective distress who is more likely to process self-relevant information in a relatively unbiased and balanced fashion. These findings are, needless to say, inconsistent with the notion that realistic and evenhanded perceptions of self are characteristic of mental health.
In addition, people substantially overestimate their degree of control over heavily chance-determined events (see Crocker, 1982).
The crux of the matter is, mildly and severely depressed individuals appear to be less vulnerable to the illusion of control ( Abramson & Alloy, 1981; Golin, Terrell, & Johnson, 1977 ; Golin, Terrell, Weitz, & Drost, 1979 ; M. S. Greenberg & Alloy, in press ). Thus, depressed individuals provide more accurate estimates of their degree of personal control than do nondepressed people. Similarly, relative to nondepressed people, those in whom a negative mood has been induced show more realistic perceptions of personal control (Alloy, Abramson, & Viscusi, 1981 Finally, In contrast to the extremely positive view of the future displayed by normal individuals, mildly depressed people and those with low self-esteem appear to entertain more balanced assessments of their likely future circumstances (see Ruehlman et al., 1985).
To sum up the argument so far, The individual who responds to negative, ambiguous, or unsupportive feedback with a positive sense of self, a belief in personal efficacy, and an optimistic sense of the future will - our discussion above suggests - tend to be happier and more productive than the individual who perceives this same information accurately and integrates it into his or her view of the self, the world, and the future. In this sense, the capacity to develop and maintain positive illusions may be thought of as a valuable human resource to be nurtured and promoted, rather than an error-prone processing system to be corrected.
This unorthodox view, however, has not gone unchallenged.
In three studies, e.g., the relation between overly positive self-evaluations and psychological adjustment was examined. Two of these were based on longitudinal data and another on laboratory data, contrasted self-descriptions of personality with observer ratings (trained examiners or friends) to index self-enhancement. In the longitudinal studies, self-enhancement was associated with poor social skills and psychological maladjustment 5 years before and 5 years after the assessment of self-enhancement. In the laboratory study, on the other hand, individuals who exhibited a tendency to self-enhance displayed behaviors, independently judged, that seemed detrimental to positive social interaction. These results indicate there are negative short-term and long-term consequences for individuals who self-enhance and, contrary to some prior formulations, imply that accurate appraisals of self and of the social environment may be essential elements of mental health (Colvin et al.).
What to make of this contradictory evidence? Which view is true? It appears that both, to a degree. All depends on what kind of individuals or their traits, in what environment, and in what period of time one takes account of. This is suggested by a range of studies which all show that illusions are in fact a mixed blessing, their effect being dependent on an array of factors.
In short, S.E. Taylor and J.D. Brown (1988) proposed that positive illusions foster mental health, whereas C.R. Colvin, J. Block, and D.C. Funder (1995) presented empirical evidence that suggested the opposite: The extent to which self-ratings are more favorable than ratings by others (self-enhancement) is correlated with unfavorable personality traits (self-enhancement correlation). But conceptual analysis shows that these propositions are not incompatible. A psychometric analysis reveals that self-enhancement correlations are a function of the self-other agreement and the consensus of others across 830 traits indicates that (a) self-enhancement is consistent across highly evaluative traits, but not across traits low in evaluativeness, and (b) self-enhancement correlations are minimal for non-evaluative traits and increase with increasing trait evaluativeness. We conclude that people consistently differ in their tendency to enhance their trait descriptions and that this tendency is linked to the unfavorability of their traits(Asendorpf, Ostendorf 1998).
Similarly, two studies addressed parallel questions about the correlates and consequences of self-enhancement bias. Study 1 was conducted in a laboratory context and examined self-enhancing evaluations of performance in a group-interaction task. Study 2 assessed students' illusory beliefs about their academic ability when they first entered college and then followed them longitudinally to test claims about the long-term benefits of positive illusions. Both studies showed that self-enhancement bias was related to narcissism, ego involvement, self-serving attributions, and positive affect. Study 2 found that self-enhancement was associated with decreasing levels of self-esteem and well-being as well as with increasing disengagement from the academic context. Self-enhancement did not predict higher academic performance or higher graduate rates. Thus, the findings suggest that self-enhancing beliefs may be adaptive in the short term but not in the long term(Robins 2001).
Reactions to trait self-enhancers were investigated in 2 longitudinal studies of person perception in discussion groups. Groups of 4-6 participants met 7 times for 20 min. After Meetings 1 and 7, group members rated their perceptions of one another. In Study 1, trait self-enhancement was indexed by measures of narcissism and self-deceptive enhancement. At the first meeting, self-enhancers made positive impressions. They were seen as agreeable, well adjusted, and competent. After 7 weeks, however, they were rated negatively and gave self-evaluations discrepant with peer evaluations they received. In Study 2, an independent sample of observers (close acquaintances) enabled a pretest index of discrepancy self-enhancement: It predicted the same deteriorating pattern of interpersonal perceptions as the other three trait measures. Nonetheless, all self-enhancement measures correlated positively with self-esteem (Paulhus1998).
To summarise, neither the conventional textbook view, nor the unorthodox one, stressing the positive function of psychological illusions, does not tell the whole story. It is not that, as they say, the truth is in the middle; rather, the situation is more complex and must be examined case by case, taking a lot of circumstances into consideration.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.
| Alicke, M. D. (1985), Global self-evaluation as determined by the desirability and controllability of trait adjectives, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 49, s.1621-1630. | |
| Alloy, L. B. & Abramson, L. Y. (1979). Judgment of contingency in depressed and non-depressed students: Sadder but wiser? Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 108, s. 441-485. | |
| Alloy, L. B. & Ahrens, A. H. (1987), Depression and pessimism for the future: Biased use of statistically relevant information in predictions for self versus others, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52, s. 366-378. | |
| Alloy, L. B., Abramson, L. Y. & Viscusi, D. (1981), Induced mood and the illusion of control, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 41, s. 1129-1140. | |
| Beevers, C. G., Keitner G. I., Ryan C. E., Miller I. W. (2003). Cognitive Predictors of Symptom Return Following Depression Treatment. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 112, s. 488-496. | |
| Brickman, P., Coates D. & Janoff-Bulman R. (1978). Lottery winners and accident victims: Is happiness relative? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 35, s. 917 – 927. | |
| Campbell, J. D. (1986). Similarity and uniqueness: The effects of attribute type, relevance, and individual differences in self-esteem and depression. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 50, s. 281-294. | |
| Chapin, J. (2000). Third person perception and optimistic bias among urban, minority, “at risk” youth. Communication Research, 27, s. 51 – 81. | |
| Chapin, J. (2001). Self – protective pessimism: Optimistic Bias in Reverse. North American Journal of Psychology, 3, s. 253 – 262. | |
| Colvin, C. R. & Block, J. (1994), Do positive illusions foster mental health? An examination of the Taylor and Brown formulation. Psychological Bulletin, 116, s. 3- 20. | |
| Colvin, C. R., Block, J. & Funder, D. C. (1995), Overly positive self-evaluations and personality: Negative implications for mental health, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 68, s. 1152-1162. | |
| Dunning, D., Story, A. L. (1991). Depression, Realism, and the Overconfidence Effect: Are the Sadder Wiser When Predicting Future Actions and Events? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 61, s. 521 – 532. | |
| Jahoda, M. (1958), Current concepts of positive mental health. New York: Basic Books | |
| Jourard, S. M. & Landsman, T. (1980), Healthy personality: An approach from the viewpoint of humanistic psychology (4th ed. ). New York: Macmillan. | |
| Kuiper, N. A. & Derry, P. A. (1982). Depressed and non-depressed content self-reference in mild depression. Journal of Personality, 50, s. 67 – 79. | |
| Langer, E. J. (1975). The illusion of control. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 32, s.311 – 328. | |
| Lewinsohn, P. M., Mischel, W., Chaplin, W. & Barton, R. (1980). Social competence and depression: The role of illusory self-perceptions. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 89, s.203-212. | |
| Maslow, A. H. (1950), Self-actualizing people: A study of psychological health, Personality, Symposium, No. 1, s. 11-34. | |
| Perloff, L. S. & Fetzer, B. K. (1986). Self-other judgments and perceived vulnerability of victimization. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 50, s.502 – 510. | |
| Pers, J. (1998), Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 74 (4), s. 955-966. | |
| Pers, J. (1998), Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 75 (5), s. 1197-1208. | |
| Pers, J. (2001), Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 80 (2), s.340-352. | |
| Robertson, L. S. (1977), Car crashes: Perceived vulnerability and willingness to pay for crash protection. Journal of Community Health, 3, s.136 – 141. | |
| Robins, R.W., Beer, J.S. (1998),Positive illusions about the self: Short-term benefits and long-term costs, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 78, s. 278-293. | |
| Robins, R.W., Beer, J.S. (2001), Positive illusions about the self: Short-term benefits and long-term costs, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 80, s. 340-352. | |
| Taylor, S. E. & Brown, J. D. (1988). Illusion and well-being: A social psychological perspective on mental health. Psychological Bulletin, 103, s.193-210. | |
| Taylor, S. E. & Brown, J. D. (1994). Positive illusions and well-being revisited: Separating fact from fiction. Psychological Bulletin, 116, s. 21-27. | |
| Thase, M. E. (1999). The long-term nature of depression. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, 60, s. 3-35. |