Jacob Clark

Mr. Conway
Diverse Learners
16 March, 2017
Beck, A. T., Weissman, A., Lester, D., & Trexler, L. (1974). The Measurement of Pessimism:
The Hopelessness Scale. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 42(6), 861-865.
This article is the first of its kind to talk about pessimism as a scale rather than a being.
When this article first came out, many of the ideas about pessimism hadnt been known
yet, many people just referred to it as a hopelessness factor. However, this study that was
conducted defined pessimism as a range rather than just a factor. In Becks study he
provided a questionnaire to hospitalized depressed patients or patients that had recently
committed suicide. the questionnaire involved 11 questions that were considered
pessimistic if the patient answered true and 9 questions that were considered optimistic if
answered true. Because of this, Beck was able to define pessimism as a system of
cognitive schemas.
Burnett, Paul (1991). Childrens Self-Talk and Significant Others Positive and Negative
Statements. Educational Resource Information Center. 1-6.
This article, though a little outdated, provides key research about positive and negative
self-esteem. While the article doesnt really mention optimism and pessimism, it does
focus heavily on perceived opinion by others and self-esteem within school aged
children. The whole goal of this study was to focus on the relationships between peers in
(roughly) middle school and other peers, teacher, and parents. The study aimed to find a
correlation between others positive and negative statements and the positive or negative
self-talk that these middle school students experienced as a result of these sayings. The
correlation between negative statements and negative self-talk as well as positive
statements and positive self-talk were glaringly obvious. Those that perceived themselves
to be positive in the eyes of their peers, parents, and teachers experienced more positive
self-talk compared to those who perceived themselves as negative in the eyes of their
peers.
Dweck, Carol. (2014, Nov). Carol Dweck: The Power of Believing You Can Improve
[Video File]. Retrieved from
https://www.ted.com/talks/carol_dweck_the_power_of_believing_that_you_can_improve
In her TedTalk, Carol Dweck discusses an idea that she refers to as yet, where believing
that something hasnt been achieved with yet has a beneficial outcome on the student
rather than students who focus on immediate rewards. She believes that students who
have been raised on the idea of instant gratification on a daily basis is creating bad habits
that will negatively influence their lives in the future. She cites the idea that yet will
change the outlook of the student, and provides examples of its successes. She cites that
in three instances (New York twice and a Native American reservation in Seattle) where
students were changed to a yet mind set where they believed that they hadnt achieved
 something yet and those students outperformed not only peers in their own school but
peers in their entire district.
Flett, G. L., Besser, A., Hewitt, P. L., & Davis, R. A. (2007). Perfectionism, Silencing the
Self, and Depression. Personality and Individual Differences, 43(5), 1211-1222.
This source is current and relevant, therefore most of the data and psychological data is to
date. In this article, Flett and his team examine whether there is a correlation between
perfectionists and their ability to silence their inner monologue. After completing the
study, Flett found that there was a positive correlation between those who are
perfectionists and their ability to silence their inner monologue. He also found that there
was a positive correlation between these perfectionists and symptoms of depression.
Pullmann, H., & Allik, J. (2008). Relations of Academic and General Self-Esteem to School
Achievement. Personality and Individual Differences, 45(6), 559-564.
In this article, Pullmann looked at how general self-esteem affected students in their
academic career. They investigated 1435 elementary students, 2746 students in grades 6,
8, 10, and 12, and 969 individuals applying for entrance into a college of social sciences.
In their experiment, they focused on both the academic and general self-esteem of these
students and how those factors affected academic performance. Pullmann found that
those with lower general self-esteem still scored higher on assignments compared to
those with higher general self-esteem. The research also pointed to the negative
correlation between academic self-esteem and GPA. Those with low ASE were more
likely to score lower on assignments than their counterparts with higher ASE. The
research did not point to a correlational interaction between General Self-Esteem and
Academic Self-Esteem.
Robinson-Whelen, S., Kim, C., MacCallum, R. C., & Kiecolt-Glaser, J. K. (1997).
Distinguishing Optimism from Pessimism in Older Adults: Is It More Important to Be
Optimistic or Not to Be Pessimistic. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 73(6),
1345-1353.
In his article, Robinson and his staff examined the rate of occurrence and outcome of
optimism and pessimism in adults. She completed an experiment where she examined
two groups of people: people who are in a caretaker position for more than five hours and
people who arent. The people that were in caretaker positions were people that cared for
a significant other in cases of Alzheimers and other neuro-cognitive disorders. The
research group found that while pessimism and optimism doesnt really show itself in
older adults, those that were in the caretaker group showed signs of pessimistic
tendencies. Because of this, the researchers were able to predict mental and physical
hindrances later (such as anxiety, depression, stress). Optimism predicted no such health
factors.
RoyChowdhury, Suchitra (2016). The Relationship Between Defensive Pessimism and
Perfectionism. International Journal of Innovative Research and Development.
5(9). 319-323.
The source is more of a combination of studies, rather than a unique study done; it aims
to find a reason why defensive pessimists have had success in the past, but now face internal
struggles when facing difficult situations that have yielded positive results in the past. The study
aims to find a correlation of defensive pessimists and different categories of perfection (concern
over mistakes, personal standards, parental expectations, parental criticism, doubts about actions,
and organization). The article makes constant references to a defensive pessimists success in the
past and wants to find the root cause of the change in their mindset. Though not as factually deep
and useful as originally thought, the article rather can help guide.

Schwartz, R. M. (1986). The Internal Dialogue: On the Asymmetry Between Positive and
Negative Coping Thoughts. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 10(6), 591-605.
Could be used in order to talk about inner monologues, what they mean, and how they
work. Its a little outdated, but it might provide crucial analysis of inner monologues and
what they mean for people. Schwarz brings together multiple sources to look at the
differences between positive inner thoughts and negative inner thoughts and which one
occurs more frequently than others. One of his ideas states that negative thoughts relate to
psychopathology, which might not be the best conclusion, but it is a bit outdated. Comes
to the conclusion that negative thoughts have more impact on a person than positive ones
do.
Shepperd, J. A., Ouellette, J. A., & Fernandez, J. K. (1996). Abandoning Unrealistic Optimism:
Performance Estimates and the Temporal Proximity of Self-Relevant Feedback.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 70(4), 844-855.
Shepperds study was a three-part study that examined multiple phases of pessimism self-
esteem. In his study, he completed three different tests in order to find a correlation
between pessimism and self-esteem issues. Through his study, he found many of the
students that he tested (sophomores, juniors, and seniors in a psychology course at two
different colleges) were defensive pessimists. In the first study, Shepperd focused on job
payment as graduation neared. He asked the above outlined students to estimate job
payment at two different times, months away from graduation and a month away from
graduation. All participants negatively changed their estimates, with the seniors
negatively changing theirs the greatest. Shepperd came to the conclusion, however, that
he was unsure whether the change was because of a pessimistic attitude or whether it was
a realism type attitude. In his second study, Shepperd analyzed how students in these
same classes would perceive their outcome on an exam at 4 different time intervals. He
asked them to estimate at 1 month out from the exam, students would then take the exam.
 The other three intervals included 5 days before feedback, 50 minutes before feedback
and 3 seconds before feedback. As the time drew nearer to their feedback, the estimate
for their score continually declined, seeming to point to that pessimistic out looks are a
factor of environment. In his third study, Shepperd looked at how students would change
their estimates based on self-esteem. He found that the 36 students that were identified to
have low self-esteem negatively changed their estimate; the other 35 students either
positively changed or neutrally changed their estimate.
Tullett, A. M., & Inzlicht, M. (2010). The Voice of Self-Control: Blocking the Inner Voice
Increases Impulsive Responding. Acta Psychologica, 135(2), 252-256.
Tullett and Inzlicht created an experiment in which he had participants engage in a go/no-
go activity (really confused as to what that is might have read over description). At the
same time, the scientists also had participants complete either a verbal or spatial
secondary task. The go/no-go activity was alternating so the answer wasnt always the
same each time. Those that completed the verbal activity were more inclined to answer
impulsively rather than those that completed the spatial activity. The scientists came to
the conclusion that many of the participants could silence their inner voices to satisfy
temptation. They suggest that there is always an ability to silence an inner critic to satisfy
our needs.