OPTIMISM AND FUNDAMENTALISM

(Sethi & Seligman, 1993)

Explanatory style from nine religious groups

representing fundamentalist(Orthodox Judaism,
Calvinism, and Islam), moderate(Conservative
Judaism, Catholicism, Lutheranism, and
Methodism), and liberal (Unitarianism and
Reformed Judaism)viewpoints was investigated.
3 Questionnaires were used.
Fundamentalist individuals were significantly
more optimistic by questionnaire than those
from moderate religions, who were in turn more
optimistic than liberals.

A Prospective Study of Optimism and

Coronary Heart Disease in the Normative Aging Study
(Kubzansky, Sparrow, Vokonas, & Kawachi, 2001)

Discovered, a sense of optimism, which derives

from the ways individuals explain causes of daily
events, has been shown to protect health, whereas
pessimism has been linked to poor physical health.
Examined the relationship of an optimistic or
pessimistic explanatory style with coronary heart
disease incidence in the Veterans Affairs Normative
Aging Study, an ongoing cohort of older men.
Results suggested that an optimistic explanatory
style may protect against risk of coronary heart
disease in older men

Positive Organizational Behavior

in the Workplace: The Impact of
Hope, Optimism, and Resilience
(Youssef
& Luthans,
2007) and the
Drawing from
the foundation
of positive psychology
recently emerging positive organizational behavior, two
studies, tested hypotheses on the impact that the selected
positive psychological resource capacities of hope, optimism,
and resilience have on desired work-related employee
outcomes.
Those outcomes included performance (self-reported in Study
1 and organizational performance appraisals in Study 2), job
satisfaction, work happiness, and organizational commitment.
The findings generally support that employees positive
psychological resource capacities relate to, and contribute
unique variance to, the outcomes. However, hope, and, to a
lesser extent, optimism and resilience, do differentially
contribute to the various outcomes.

Positive Psychological Capital: Measurement and

Relationship with Performance and Satisfaction
(Luthans, Avolio, Avey, & Norman, 2007)

Two studies were conducted to analyze how hope, resilience, optimism, and
efficacy individually and as a composite higher-order factor predicted work
performance and satisfaction.
Results from Study 1 provided psychometric support for a new survey
measure designed to assess each of these 4 facets, as well as a composite
factor.
Study 2 results indicated a significant positive relationship regarding the
composite of these 4 facets with performance and satisfaction.
Results from Study 2 also indicated that the composite factor may be a
better predictor of performance and satisfaction than the 4 individual facets.
Findings from this study would seem to have many practical implications for
the development and management of human resources motivational
propensities in todays workplace.
Employees who are more hopeful, optimistic, efficacious, and resilient may
be more likely to weather the storm of the type of dynamic, global
environmental contexts confronting most organizations today better than
their counterparts with lower Psychological Capital.

relationships with leader's social

responsibility, top management
team effectiveness and
subordinates' optimism: A multistudy
The objective of themethod
study was to examine
the relationships of

leader's social responsibility

different2008)
aspects of ethical
(Hoogh &with
Hartog,
leadership as well as with despotic leadership.
They also investigated how these leadership behaviors relate to
effectiveness and optimism, using multiple-source ratings.
Interviews with were coded for the presence of leader's social
responsibility and its facets. Also, using questionnaires, direct
reports rated each CEOs' leader behavior and a second group of
direct reports rated effectiveness and optimism.
Results showed that, leaders high on social responsibility were
rated higher on ethical leadership and lower on despotic
leadership.
Ethical leadership was also positively related to perceived top
management team effectiveness and subordinates' optimism
about the future of the organization and their own place within it.

Moderator of the Association

Between Negative Life Events and
Suicide Ideation
(Hirsch, Wolford, LaLonde, Brunk
The aim of this study was to examine the moderating
, & Parker-Morris, 2009)

effect of explanatory style on the relationship between

negative life experiences and suicide ideation in a
college student sample.
Results showed that Optimistic explanatory style
mitigates the influence of negative and potentially
traumatic life events on thoughts of suicide, above and
beyond the effects of hopelessness and depression.
Optimistic explanatory style was associated with
reduced suicide ideation, whereas pessimistic
explanatory style was associated with increased
thoughts of suicide.

Dispositional Optimism and Treatment Compliance in

Heroin Addicts
(Zaidi, 2014)

This most recent study aimed to investigate the relationship

of dispositional optimism and treatment compliance in
heroin addicts.
It was hypothesized that dispositional optimism would be
negatively correlated with treatment compliance in them.
Results suggested that there is a significant negative
correlation between the dispositional optimism and
treatment compliance in heroin addicts.
Significant relation was found between treatment
compliance and variables of External reason, Internal
reason, help seeking and confidence.
Additionally, correlation of number of relapses with
dispositional optimism and treatment compliance was done.