"Don't worry, everything will be fine," says the brain
One reason optimists retain a positive outlook even in the face of evidence to the contrary has been discovered, say researchers.
A study, published in Nature Neuroscience, suggests the brain is very good at processing good news about the future.
However, in some people, anything negative is practically ignored - with them retaining a positive world view.
The authors said optimism did have important health benefits.
Scientists at University College London said about 80% of people were optimists, even if they would not label themselves as such.
They rated 14 people for their level of optimism and tested them in a brain scanner.
Each was asked how likely 80 different "bad events" - including a divorce or having cancer - were to happen.
They were then told how likely this was in reality. At the end of the session, the participants were asked to rate the probabilities again.
There was a marked difference in the updated scores of optimists depending on whether the reality was good or bad news.
Dr Tali Sharot, lead researcher, gave the example of the risk of cancer being set at 30%.
If the patient thought their risk was 40%, then at the end of the experiment they downgraded their own risk to about 31%, she said.
However, if the patient originally thought their risk was 10%, they only marginally increased their risk - they "leaned a little bit, but not a lot".
Pick and choose
When the news was positive, all people had more activity in the brain's frontal lobes, which are associated with processing errors. With negative information, the most optimistic people had the least activity in the frontal lobes, while the least optimistic had the most.
It suggests the brain is picking and choosing which evidence to listen to.
Dr Sharot said: "Smoking kills messages don't work as people think their chances of cancer are low. The divorce rate is 50%, but people don't think it's the same for them. There is a very fundamental bias in the brain."
Dr Chris Chambers, neuroscientist from the University of Cardiff, said: "It's very cool, a very elegant piece of work and fascinating.
"For me, this work highlights something that is becoming increasingly apparent in neuroscience, that a major part of brain function in decision-making is the testing of predictions against reality - in essence all people are 'scientists'.
"And despite how sophisticated these neural networks are, it is illuminating to see how the brain sometimes comes up with wrong and overly optimistic answers despite the evidence."
Optimism seem to be good for your health. A study on nearly 100,000 women showed a lower risk of heart disease and lower death rate in optimists.
But as Dr Sharot points out: "The negative aspect is that we underestimate risks."
Source: bbc.co.uk
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To understand that as human being you received time,
your very own time on Earth.
Time is money? Time is Art!
Very very interesting. "The negative aspect is that we underestimate the risks." I see a lot of that but I actually admire that trait due to the power of manifestation. Underestimating the risks and manifesting a positive outcome can be cousins to one another. I tend to have an opitmistic outlook on a lot of things, and even if the outcome does not meet meet my positive expectations, I am quick to dismiss and say well I did not try to manifest as much as I should, was not convinced enough, and then I try for the same outcome again, which often is sheer lunacy on my part, lol. i think it is my optimism that keeps me going actually, I have had so many physical challenges to overcome and have been a death's door more than once. I simply tell myself now that an ailment is not going to get me, and it works somewhat as I am still here. Don't know if any of what I just said made sense, but just felt like expressing it.