The Importance Of Defensive Pessimism

Most individuals can attest to being too self-critical and have a pessimistic attitude towards a situation at a point in their lives. It is simple to assume that pessimistic attitudes and anxiety would be less effective in coping with stressful events, but studies indicate using defensive pessimism is effective in coping with anxiety and motivate performance (Norem and Cantor, ). Recent studies have demonstrated that rumination, or the tendency to dwell on a future event and rehearse all scenarios, is associated with negative emotions and depression. Individuals who are depressed or ruminate set low expectations on the situation at hand and cannot adapt or cope with the stress of the situation, thus avoiding or never achieving the goal (Spencer

Many college students are defensive pessimist, but do not even know it; especially, since stress and anxiety are common among college students. Example: An end of the year research paper and presentation is assigned to a graduating senior who is anxious and nervous of how it will impact the final grade. The student creates multiple scenarios on the many ways which failure is inevitable: lack of time, possibility of losing completed work or forgetting information during the presentation. At the same time, almost as a natural response to threat, the individual devises strategies on how to avoid all possible disasters. In other words, DPs channel their anxiety to motivate themselves toward success (Spencer & Norem, 1996). When SP are distracted from being able to analyze and “think through” the negative and defensive outcomes, performance is lower than expected and demonstrate negative affects (Norem & Illingworth,

SOs set high expectations for future occurrences without creating strategically defensive outcomes. SOs’ confidence stems from previous attributions and past success. Perhaps, to avoid stressing on the task or building anxiety, SOs will focus on other tasks irrelevant to the situation. SO’s demonstrate more positive affect and high appraisal on the completion of the task when distractions are allowed prior to performance (Norem & Illingworth, 2004). SOs in college would be students who feel confident, do not seem anxious and do not focus primarily on the difficulty or length of the assignment but instead, tends to focus on other events or easier assignments. Both SOs and DPs are strategic in that both facilitate success. For DPs the solution tends to be positive, as explained above but there still lies the possibility of ‘burnout’ (when stress and anxiety triggers emotional exhaustion) resorting to a behavioral self-handicapping (Akin, 2012). Self-handicapping would allow overwhelmed DPs to excuse failure, when expectations are set low. In order to preserve self-esteem, DPs will either externalize failure to construct strategies and avoid such failures; or if overwhelmed, they cease strategic defense and avoid responsibility (Cantor &Norem,