To examine the connection between nervousness, and pessimism versus optimism, researchers appeared on the attitudes of over 600 faculty college students earlier than their exams. They had the scholars predict the grades they anticipated on their checks, discovering that some college students clearly displayed an optimism bias, whereas others displayed the other.
As the examine authors write, “Individuals with elevated negative emotionality, a personality trait linked to the development of anxiety disorders, displayed a global pessimism and learning differences that impeded accurate expectations and predicted future anxiety symptoms.”
In different phrases, even when pessimists did higher than they anticipated on their checks, they did not transfer ahead with an up to date perspective that their good grades might be replicated. Meanwhile, optimists did increase expectations of their grades primarily based on their efficiency.
Then, when surveyed three years later, it was the pessimists who confirmed larger indicators of tension. The examine authors observe this pessimism might be a coping mechanism to keep away from disappointment, which can be a symptom of tension. “We hypothesize that a conditioned aversion to negative and unpredictable events would lead a person to develop a pessimistic and inaccurate model of the world, which may predict risk for anxiety,” the examine authors add.