Thursday, October 29, 2009

Positivity

There's this really cool university study from some years ago into the infectiousness of people who give off a good vibe. It goes something like this. When you test people for optimism at age 16, and test again at age 60, people tested will tend (strongly - overwhelmingly strongly in fact) to have the same degree of optimism or pessimism whatever their age. In other words, it remains very constant. People who think the glass is half full, Vs. those who view it as half empty. Barring acts of god, violence or traumatic events which deal to everyone no matter their outlook, you can say a person on the whole has a pretty stable outlook on life. Now, the study was by way of an experiment and it went something like this. A group of strangers were judged on their optimism and then a room was filled with people - half who were optmists and the other half pessimists. They were not allowed to speak, only to look at each other. When they were taken from the room and their outlook tested, the pessimists actually scored far more optmistically - happily maybe? In other words, the optimists give off a vibe of some sort that can catch on. In the real word we all know people who we would rather not be around when we feel ratshit and all know people who can cheer us up.

Where is this going?

Well.... the current (soon to be deposed) AWF&G Council has 10 pessimists, one perhaps optimist (I don't know he's too sick to go out in public) and one known hippy partaking of hippy activities invlolving a type of tabacco frowned on by the police. The sky must be falling! We have no money! There are no ducks!

Some positivity would be in order, and it catches, so even 6 new councillors with a positive outlook, will be a very very good thing.

No comments:

Post a Comment