![]() Finally, the effect was flipped into pessimism bias toward an out-group that was perceived as most distant from our participants and was also cold and low competent (i.e. businesspersons) was associated with substantially reduced social optimism bias. By contrast, an out-group that was perceived as cold and competent (i.e. When specifying the likelihood of different events happening to both in-group characters and different out-group characters, participants revealed equally strong optimism biases toward the in-group as they did toward an out-group that was perceived as warm but low competent. Whether and how unrealistic optimism manifests toward out-group members depends on the stereotypical characteristics assigned to them. Finally, the sole functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study that focused on social optimism bias identified similar regions: social optimism bias in American football fans was characterized by enhanced positive connectivity between the primary visual cortex on the one hand and the insula, PCC and striatum on the other ( Aue et al., 2012). Beyond these regions, the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), posterior cingulate cortex (PCC) and insula have been associated with personal optimism bias ( Blair et al., 2013 Kuzmanovic et al., 2016). Interestingly, activation of the aforementioned regions is also enhanced while an individual deliberates over in-group members ( Volz et al., 2009 Cikara et al., 2017). Personal optimism biases and trait optimism have been linked to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) and the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), brain regions involved in self-referential processing and stimulus valuation ( Blair et al., 2013 Kuzmanovic et al., 2016). Correspondingly, one may expect some overlap in neural correlates between personal and social optimism biases. For instance, an individual’s readiness to display (social) optimism bias is likely influenced by dispositional optimism, a relatively stable disposition of having an optimistic yet not necessarily unrealistic life orientation ( Radcliffe and Klein, 2002 Shepperd et al., 2015). While there is a general tendency toward unrealistic optimism in the population, there is also interindividual variability in optimism bias and its related concepts. Accordingly, sports fans are overly optimistic about their favorite team winning the game ( Price, 2000 Aue et al., 2012), and voters overestimate the chances of their preferred political candidate winning elections ( Babad, 1997). Interestingly, such unrealistic optimism extends toward in-groups and individuals that one evaluates positively or identifies with (we refer to this extension of optimism toward others as social optimism bias). This self-centered overoptimism has been termed optimism bias in the literature ( Windschitl and Stuart, 2015) and has been suggested as a prerequisite for mental health ( Trimmer, 2016). Most people display exaggerated optimism about their own future. Optimism bias can be defined as the tendency to expect positive outcomes to be more likely than negative outcomes ( Krizan and Windschitl, 2007 Lench and Ditto, 2008 Lench and Bench, 2012 Dricu et al., 2018). A shared biological substrate underlying future expectancies that subserves the promotion of the self and the denigration of unpopular out-groups may render society-wide efforts to counteract stereotyping particularly difficult: such efforts may hinder the establishment of adaptive personal optimism biases. This self-enhancement dimension included unfavorable biases toward unpopular out-groups and indicators of personal optimism and pessimism. We identified a defensive self-enhancement dimension that associated significantly and reliably with the cortical thickness of the insula and inferior frontal cortex. Using sparse canonical correlation analysis, we associated cortical thickness (assessed by magnetic resonance imaging) with measures of social and personal optimism bias, trait optimism and related concepts. However, little is known about whether social optimism biases relate to brain structure. Such biases are important for mental health and may extend to other individuals or social groups (social optimism biases). Optimism biases denote the tendency to see future desirable events as being more likely to happen to oneself than undesirable events. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |