The Optimism Bias

"This is a fairly recent book which covers a lot more than just optimism. A large part of the book looks at irrationality. The idea is that we like to think that we are very rational and straightforward but actually we are not. She has picked up on this bias, which she calls the optimism bias. It has also been called the positivity illusion in the past – the idea that all of us tend to have a more optimistic take on life than is actually the case. For example, if I ask you whether you think you will earn more than the average person does in a lifetime you will probably say yes. Likewise, most people asked are convinced that they will be the ones having a happy marriage. If you ask people to predict all of these different things they tend to take a very optimistic view on them. One of the arguments that Sharot makes is that this is very much of evolutionary benefit to us, because if we don’t have an optimistic take on life we won’t get out and do very much. Yes. In my book, Rainy Brain , Sunny Brain , I talk about rainy brains and sunny brains. It is the case that our brain tunes in much more naturally to fearful stimuli, which I argue in evolutionary terms makes absolute sense. These were things that in the past we really needed to be looking out for to stay alive. There are two main kinds of information that our brain tunes into very naturally and this is genetically given. We tune into things that are dangerous to us, and things that are going to benefit us. That could be good food or sex. But fear trumps pleasure because it is far more important to notice something which is going to eat you. Of course, with time we have had to learn to rationalise those fears – now, if we see a snake in a glass cage in a zoo, although initially we are fearful we can tell ourselves not to worry. We have learnt to balance the two. In my book I talk about the fear brain and the pleasure brain, and how they are the well springs of optimistic and pessimistic mind-sets. At the very root of a pessimistic mind-set is the fear brain, and at the very root of an optimistic mind-set is the pleasure brain. That is also something I have been researching. I have looked at particular genes to see whether they are related to optimism or pessimism. There is one gene, called the serotonin transporter gene, that has been linked to negative thinking in the past. People who have the short version of this gene show a more negative way of thinking than people with a longer version of the gene. There was one long-term study conducted over a 23 year period, and they were specifically interested in looking at whether people with the shorter version of this gene were more prone to becoming depressed. We know that negative thinking is a risk factor for depression. At the end of their studies, they discovered that people with the short gene weren’t any more at risk than people with the long version of the gene. But that all changed when they looked at the kind of life experiences that people had. If four or more negative life events happened to them, like an accident, a bad illness or child abuse, the people with the short version of the gene were far less likely to cope with it well and then they did become more prone to depression. This is a very good early example of what we call gene by environment interaction. From that we can see that the interaction between the gene and the environment is very important."