Believe it, achieve it.
That’s the key to success, according to a new study from the University of Essex, which was published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
Researchers found that hope, positive perceptions and feelings of being in control yield a greater desire for accomplishment.
The study featured more than 1,000 students across four different countries — the US, Britain, Germany and Canada — and looked at their reactions and emotional reasoning when faced with challenging circumstances.
Researchers investigated whether individuals in a typical performance-based challenge — such as completing a task or taking a test — experience one of 12 “achievement emotions.” Positive emotions included enjoyment, relaxation, hope, assurance, pride and relief, while negative ones were anger, boredom, anxiety, hopelessness, shame/guilt and disappointment.
Participants then filled out a questionnaire indicating how they felt in certain situations, such as attending class and studying. They had to rank their feelings toward an assignment with answers such as, “I enjoy doing my work assignments,” “I am hopeful that I will perform well at my work,” “Doing my work makes me irritated” and “I worry that I might fail.”
Negative feelings like anxiety and anger were found to act as stimulators to get tasks done much as enjoyment and hope did. But the downside to negative motivation is that dark thoughts can be self-sabotaging, leading to a lack of strategizing and stress-related ailments such as headaches, back pain and lack of sleep, the authors wrote.
“Interestingly we found feelings like anxiety and anger can sometimes motivate us more than enjoyment or relaxation. However, despite its energizing powers, the knife edge of anxiety can lead to mental health issues, undermine the functioning of the immune system, and lead to a drop in performance in the long run,” Reinhard Pekrun, a lead author of the study and professor in Essex’s Department of Psychology, said in a statement.
Indeed, the findings suggest that if two students of equal academic ability took a test, the more hopeful of the two would get the higher grade.
“Although the model might seem abstract at first sight, it shows how achievement emotions relate to critically important parts of our lives and can define how we perform in job interviews, tests and other stressful situations,” Pekrun said.
Separate research suggests optimistic thinking can have myriad health benefits. Researchers say hopeful thinking can increase life span, lower rates of depression, promote cardiovascular health and boost resistance to illness, according to the Mayo Clinic.
“Overall hope was the healthiest and best way to spark success and promote long-term happiness,” Pekrun said.