Amity Institute of Psychology and Allied Sciences

Module 4
Positive Cognitive States and Processes

Descriptors/Topics
 Conceptual Understanding of self-efficacy
 Conceptual Understanding of Optimism
 Conceptual Understanding of Hope and Resilience
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• TWO THEORIES IN OPTIMISM

• - First is learned optimism/ explanatory
(attribution)as studied by Martin Seligman and
colleagues,
• - second is the view of optimism as dispositional
optimism advanced by Michael Scheier and Charles
Carver.
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• Attribution style (explanatory style) (Seligman, 1998) refers to the

• way in which one explains the causes and influences of previous positive and negative events in
order to create expectancies about the future.

• Research has shown that attributions for negative events are more important than those for
positive events.
• Pessimists explain negative events by inferring
• internal, stable or global causes:
• The event was caused by myself (internal) personalization,
by something that is chronic (stable) permanence, or
by something that is pervasive and will affect other situations as well (global).

• Optimists explain negative events by inferring

• external, unstable or local causes:
• The event was caused by something/someone other than myself (external),
by something that will probably not persist (unstable) or
by something that is probably limited to this specific circumstance (local).
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• Optimists adopt
•
• external (leaving one’s self-esteem intact)
• unstable (temporary event), and
• specific (depending on circumstances)
explanations for bad events.
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• In technical terms, the optimist makes

• external, variable (unstable), and
specific attributions for failure-like events rather than
the internal, stable, and global attributions of the
pessimist.
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• Scales: Can Learned Optimism be Measured?

• The instrument used to measure attributional style in adults is called the Attributional Style Questionnaire
(ASQ; Peterson et al., 1982), the instrument for children is the Children’s Attributional Style Questionnaire
(CASQ; Seligman et al., 1984).

• The ASQ poses either a negative or a positive life event, and respondents are asked to indicate what they
believe to be the causal explanations of those events on the dimensions of internal/external, stable/transient,
and global/specific.

• Beyond the explanatory style scales for adults and children, University of Michigan psychologist Chris
Peterson and his colleagues (1985) have developed
• the Content Analysis of Verbal Explanation (CAVE) approach for deriving ratings of optimism and
pessimism from written or spoken words.
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• What Learned Optimism Predicts

• The various indices of learned optimism have spawned a large amount of research (see Carr, 2004), with the
learned optimistic rather than pessimistic explanatory style associated with the following:

• 1. Better academic performances (Peterson & Barrett, 1987; Seligman, 1998b)

• 2. Superior athletic performances (Seligman, Nolen-Hoeksema, Thornton, & Thornton, 1990)
• 3. More productive work records (Seligman & Schulman, 1986)
• 4. Greater satisfaction in interpersonal relationships (Fincham, 2000)
• 5. More effective coping with life stressors (Nolen-Hoeksema, 2000)
• 6. Less vulnerability to depression (Abramson, Alloy et aI., 2000)
• 7. Superior physical health (Peterson, 2000).
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• Optimism-Scheier & Carver

• definition of optimism, which they described as
• the stable tendency to believe that good rather than bad things will happen.”

• Scheier and Carver assumed that, when a goal is of sufficient value, then the individual
• would produce an expectancy about attaining that goal.

• Dispositional optimism (Scheier and Carver, 1987) is defined as

• a personality trait relating to generalized outcome expectancies (goe).

• Thus optimists are characterized by their broad expectancy that outcomes are likely to be positive
whereas pessimists are characterized by the future anticipation of negative outcomes.
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Scheier and Carver (2009) posit that optimism is tied into their self-regulatory model, which states that all
human activity is based on goals.
When experiencing hardship while trying to reach these goals,
• people who are optimists will continue and push through in order to reach their goal, whereas
• pessimistic people will be more likely to give up (Carver and Scheier, 1998).

• Charles Carver and Michael Scheier

• coined the term dispositional optimism

• They argued that it is the presence of positive traits that increases that chances of something good happening to us.
• Thus,
• these generalized outcome expectancies may involve perceptions about being able to move toward desirable goals or
to move away from undesirable goals (Carver & Scheier, 1999).
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• The two main elements of dispositional optimism are the concepts of

• expectancy and
• confidence.

• Expectancy is the most crucial element as it has a direct link with expectancy value theories of motivation,
• which posit that all behaviour is a result of the desire to obtain a person’s values or goals.
• Thus, in order to achieve the goal, it must have value and spark motivation to continue (Scheier
and Carver, 2009).

• Confidence, the second element, is highly influential on optimism.

• If confidence is high that the goal can be achieved, then the person is more likely to act.
• If there is doubt, then the person will disengage.
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• Psychologists measure dispositional optimism via the

LOT-R, a short ten-item
• questionnaire that focuses on differentiating optimists
from pessimists (Scheier, Carver and Bridges, 1994).
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• Scales: Can Optimism be Measured?

• Scheier and Carver (1985) introduced their index of optimism,

• the Life Orientation Test (LOT), as including
• positive (“I’m always optimistic about my future”) and
• negative (“I rarely count on good things happening to me”) expectancies.

• The LOT has displayed acceptable

• internal consistency (alpha of .76 in original sample)
• and a test-retest correlation of .79 over 1 month.
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Assessment
Life Orientation Test
• The Life Orientation Test (LOT) was designed by Scheier and Carver (1985) to assess dispositional optimism
– expecting positive or negative outcomes, and is one of the more popular tests of optimism and pessimism.

• There are eight items and four filler items.

• Four are positive items (e.g. "In uncertain times, I usually expect the best") and
• four are negative items e.g. "If something can go wrong for me, it will."

• The LOT has been revised twice—once by the original creators (LOT-R) and also by Chang, Maydeu-Olivares,
and D'Zurilla as the Extended Life Orientation Test (ELOT).

• The Revised Life Orientation Test (LOT-R: Scheier, Carver, & Bridges, 1994)
• consists of 6 items, each scored on a 5-point scale from "Strongly disagree" to "Strongly agree".
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• Attributional Style Questionnaire

• This Attributional Style Questionnaire (ASQ: Peterson et al. 1982 ) is based on the 
explanatory style model of optimism.

• Subjects read a list of six positive and negative events (e.g. "you have been looking for a job
unsuccessfully for some time"), and are asked to record a possible cause for the event.

• They then rate whether this is internal or external, stable or changeable, and global or local to the
event.

•  There are several modified versions of the ASQ including the

• Expanded Attributional Style Questionnaire (EASQ),
• the Content Analysis of Verbatim Explanations (CAVE), and the
• ASQ designed for testing the optimism of children.
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HOPE

As psychologist and renowned hope researcher Charles Snyder (2002, p. 269) stated so eloquently:

A rainbow is a prism that sends shards of multicolored light in various directions. It lifts our spirits and makes
us think of what is possible. Hope is the same – a personal rainbow of the mind.
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• What is Hope?

• According to Snyder et al. (1991)

• Hope is a positive cognitive state based on a sense of successful
• goal-directed determination and
• planning to meet these goals.

• In other words,
• hope is like a snap-shot of a person’s current goal-directed thinking,
• and the expectation that those goals can be achieved.
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• Snyder et al (1991) emphasized the relevance of hope in the context of doing –

that is the capacity to achieve goals.

• According to Snyder’s Hope Theory (Snyder, 1991),

• hopefulness is a life-sustaining human strength comprised of three distinct but related components:
• Goals Thinking – the clear conceptualization of valuable goals.
• Pathways Thinking – the capacity to develop specific strategies to reach those goals.
• Agency Thinking – the ability to initiate and sustain the motivation for using those strategies.
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Benefits of Having Hope

• Hope is significantly correlated with superior academic and athletic performance, greater physical and psychological
well-being, improved self-esteem, and enhanced interpersonal relationships
(Rand & Cheavens, 2012).
• Hope has the potential to enhance well-being over time.
Erez & Isen (2002) found that individuals who are more hopeful and expect to be successful in achieving goals are more
likely to experience a state of well-being.

• Individuals with high hope are more likely to view stressful situations as challenging rather than threatening, thereby
reducing the intensity and hindering the proliferation of stress
(Lazarus & Launier, 1978).
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1. Is Hope The Same as Optimism?

2. Isn’t Hope Just Wishful Thinking( desire/wants)? = NO
3. How Does Hope Differ From Wanting?
4. What Are Some Common Barriers To Hope?
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The Adult Hope Scale (AHS)

• Often referred to as the Trait Hope Scale or the Future Scale, the Adult Hope Scale
(AHS; Snyder et al., 1991) is a 12-item measure of hope designed for individuals over 15 years of age.

The scale is divided into two subscales which fit the cognitive model of hope (Snyder, 1991) in which hope is a
positive motivational state based on an interactively derived sense of successful:
• Agency thinking (goal-directed energy)
• Pathways thinking (planning to accomplish goals)
• Of the 12 items, four items measure pathways thinking, four items measure agency thinking, and four items are
fillers. Each item is answered using an 8-point scale ranging from 1 (Definitely False) to 8 (Definitely True).
• After completion, subscale scores can be examined independently or combined to create a total hope score. The
higher the total score, the higher the overall degree of the respondent’s hope.
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The State Hope Scale (SHS)

• Also known as the Goals Scale for the Present, the State Hope Scale (SHS; Snyder et al., 1996)
was developed to assess goal-directed thinking in a given moment.

Without identifying specific goals, the short 6-item self-report SHS measures an individual’s momentary hopeful thinking
by asking respondents to rate items based on how they think about themselves on an 8-point Likert scale from 1
(definitely false) to 8 (definitely true).
• The State Hope Scale measures a person’s level of hope at a single point in time and is based on the respondent’s
current situation.
• Pathways subscale scores can be calculated by adding the scores for items 1, 3, and 5 – higher scores indicate higher
levels of pathways thinking.
• Agency subscale scores can be calculated by adding the scores of items 2, 4, and 6 – higher scores indicate higher
levels of agency thinking.
• Total hope scores can be calculated by combining the pathways and agency subscales together –
higher scores represent higher overall hope levels.
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The Children’s Hope Scale (CHS; Snyder et al., 1997)

• The CHS is designed to measure hopeful thinking in children and adolescents between the ages of 8–16.

• The self-report scale consists of six items measured across a

6-point scale ranging from 1 (none of the time) to 6 (all the time).

• Three items on the CHS evaluate

• pathways thinking, for instance,
“I can think of many ways to get the things in life that are most important to me” and

• three items examine agency, for instance,

“I think I am doing pretty well.”
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Resilience
• Humans’ amazing ability to bounce back and even thrive in the face of serious life challenges.

• Ann Masten (2001, p. 228) defines resilience as

• “a class of phenomenon characterized by good outcomes in spite of serious threats to adaptation or

development” (author’s italics).

• As Masten (2001) notes, two factors are involved.

• For a judgment of resilience to be made, a person must first face a “significant” threat or risk that has the
potential to produce negative outcomes.

• Research has investigated a variety of factors that may threaten normal development.
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• The second part of resilience requires judgment of a favorable or good outcome.

•  The standards for judging outcomes may be defined by the normative expectations of society for the age and situation of
the individual (Masten, 2001).

• Finally, Masten (2001) notes that some researchers have also defined resilience- ( ORDINARY MAGIC)

• as an absence of problem behaviors or psychopathology following adversity.

•  Children of alcoholic, mentally ill, or abusive parents

• may be judged resilient if they don’t develop

• substance abuse problems, suffer mental illness, become abusive parents themselves, or show symptoms of poor
adjustment.
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• The foundations of resilience include

• psychological resources such as a flexible self-concept that permits people to change key features of
their self-definition in response to changing circumstances,

• a sense of autonomy and self-direction, and

• environmental mastery and

• competence.

•  Social resources are also important to resilience.

• Included here are quality relationships with others who provide intimacy and social support.
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• Major reason for studying resilient individuals is to learn about

• the protective factors that contribute to resilience in order to help people cope more
effectively with life challenges.

• The focus is on increasing our understanding and the availability of these protective factors.

• what are the protective factors involved in resilience?

• It is certainly true that some people are more resilient than others in the face of adversity.
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• What explains the difference between resilient and less resilient people? 

I. Trait explanations of resilience have attempted to profile the characteristics of the “resilient personality.”

• Such concepts as ego-resilience (Block & Block, 1980),

• hardiness (Kobasa, Maddi, & Kahn, 1982),

• toughness (Dienstbier & Pytlik Zillig, 2002),

• self-enhancement (Taylor & Brown, 1988), and

• optimism (e.g., Carver & Scheier, 2002b; Tennen & Affleck, 2002)

• have all been related to more effective coping with stressful life events.
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Sources of Resilience in Children

• Protective factors within the child include:

• • Good intellectual and problem-solving abilities

• • An easy-going temperament and a personality that can adapt to change

• • A positive self-image and personal effectiveness

• • An optimistic outlook

• • Ability to regulate and control emotions and impulses

• • Individual talents that are valued by the individual and by his or her culture
• • A healthy sense of humor
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• Protective factors within the family include:

• • Close relationships with parents or other primary caregivers

• • Warm and supportive parenting that provides clear expectations and rules

• • An emotionally positive family with minimal conflict between parents

• • A structured and organized home environment

• • Parents who are involved in their child’s education

• • Parents who have adequate financial resources
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• Protective factors within the community include:

• • Going to a good school

• • Involvement in social organizations within the school and community

• • Living in a neighborhood of involved and caring people who address problems and promote community spirit

• • Living in a safe neighborhood

• • Easy availability of competent and responsive emergency, public health, and social services
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• The six dimensions from Ryff’s well being model describe aspects of an

• individual’s personality,

• self-concept,

• competence, and

• social relationships
• that represent resources for effective living.
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• Based on the popular method from cognitive behavioural therapy (Beck, 1976), research has shown that when
we are faced with a challenging situation,

• employing the ABCDE technique, where

• A _ Adversity (the issue or event);

• B _ Beliefs (automatic pessimistic beliefs about the event);

• C _ Consequences (of holding that belief);

• D _ Disputation (your conscious arguments against your pessimistic belief); and

• E _ Energization (what you feel when you’ve disputed your B effectively),

can increase resilience and decrease depression levels (Gillham et al., 1995, 2007).
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Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC)

• This scale was originally developed by Connor-Davidson (2003) as a self-report measure of resilience within the Post
Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) clinical community (CD-RISC, n.d.). It is a validated and widely recognized scale
with 2, 10, and 25 items which measure resilience as a function of five interrelated components:
• Personal Competence
• Acceptance of Change and Secure Relationships
• Trust/Tolerance/Strengthening Effects of Stress
• Control
• Spiritual Influences
• With an extensive number of studies using this tool, conducted within a varied range of populations, the
CD-RISC is considered one of the higher scoring scales in the psychometric evaluation of resilience (Windle, Bennett, &
Noyes, 2011).
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Resilience Scale for Adults (RSA)

• The RSA, another resilience scale rated highly by Windle, Bennett, & Noyes (2011), was authored by Friborg et al.
(2003) as a self-report scale targeting adults. It is recommended for use in the health and clinical psychology
population.
• This scale has five scoring items that examine both
the intrapersonal and interpersonal protective factors that promote adaptation to adversity.
• The authors, Friborg et al. (2003), noted the key factors which contribute to highly resilient individuals, namely family
support and cohesion, external support systems, and dispositional attitudes and behaviors, which the scale items are
founded on. They are:
 Personal Competence
 Social Competence
 Social Support
 Family Coherence
 Personal Structure
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Self-Efficacy: The Power of Believing You Can

• Self-efficacy is not
self-image, self-worth, self-esteem or any other similar construct.

Self-efficacy is the
belief we have in our own abilities, specifically our ability to meet the challenges ahead of us and complete a task
successfully (Akhtar, 2008).

General self-efficacy
refers to our overall belief in our ability to succeed, but there are many more specific forms of self-efficacy as well
(e.g., academic, parenting, sports)
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• The psychological theory of self-efficacy grew out of the research of Albert Bandura.

• He noticed that there was a mechanism that played a huge role in people’s lives .
This mechanism was the belief that people have in their ability to influence the events of their own lives.

• Bandura proposed that perceived self-efficacy influences

what coping behavior is initiated when an individual is met with stress and challenges, along with
determining how much effort will be expended to reach one’s goals and for how long those goals will be pursued (1999).

• He posited that self-efficacy is a self-sustaining trait;

when a person is driven to work through their problems on their own terms, they gain positive experiences that
in turn boost their self-efficacy even more.
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• Locus of Control Explained

• To put self-efficacy in other terms, you might say that those with high self-efficacy have an internal locus of control.

• The locus of control refers to where you believe the power to alter your life events resides:
within you (internal locus of control) or
outside of you (external locus of control).

• If you immediately have thoughts like, “I only failed because the teacher graded unfairly—I couldn’t do anything to
improve my score”
you likely have an external locus of control. That means that you do not have a solid sense of belief in your
own abilities.
• In juxtaposition to the external locus of control is the internal locus of control,
in which an individual is quick to admit her own mistakes and failures, and is willing to take the credit and
blame whenever it is due to her.

• Self-efficacy and an internal locus of control often go hand-in-hand, but too far in either direction can be problematic;
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Social Cognitive Theory and Self-Efficacy

• The Social Cognitive Theory is also based on the work of Albert Bandura and
incorporates the idea of self-efficacy.

• This theory posits that

effective learning happens when an individual is in a social context and
able to engage in both dynamic and reciprocal interactions between the person, the environment, and the behavior
(LaMorte, 2016). 
• SCT is based on six constructs:
1. Reciprocal Determinism: the dynamic interaction of person and behavior;
2. Behavioral Capability: the individual’s actual ability to perform the appropriate behavior;
3. Observational Learning: learning a new skill or piece of knowledge by observing others
4. Reinforcements: the external responses to the individual’s behavior that either encourage or discourage the behavior;
5. Expectations: the anticipated consequences of behavior;
6. Self-efficacy: the person’s confidence in his or her ability to perform a behavior (LaMorte, 2016).
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Measuring Tools
• General/Generalized Self-Efficacy Scale (GSE)

• The General Self-Efficacy Scale may be the most popular self-efficacy scale. It has been in use since 1995
and has been cited in hundreds of articles.

• It was developed by researchers Schwarzer and Jerusalem, two leading experts in self-efficacy.
• The scale consists of 10 items rated on a scale from 1 (Not true at all) to 4 (Exactly true).

• The score is calculated by adding up the response to each item.

The total will be between 10 and 40, with higher scores indicating higher self-efficacy.

• The scale has proven to be reliable and valid in multiple contexts and cultures.
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How to Improve Self-Efficacy Beliefs and Expectations

According to Bandura, there are four main sources of self-

efficacy beliefs:
1.Mastery experiences;
2.Vicarious experiences;
3.Verbal persuasion;
4.Emotional and physiological states
(Akhtar,
2008).
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Why Is Self-Efficacy Important?

• Importance in five areas:

• self-efficacy and psychological adjustment;
• self-efficacy and physical health;
• self-efficacy and self-regulation;
• self-efficacy and psychotherapy;
• and collective efficacy.
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Thank you