Optimistic Update for Positive Life Events? An Unbiased Test

When it comes to estimating future events (rather than evaluating abilities and characteristics most (e.g. Baker & Emery, 1993; Kuzmanovic et al., 2015, 2016; Sharot et al., 2011) but not all (Weinstein, 1980; Wiswall & Zafar, 2015), studies have examined predictions specifically regarding aversive events (such as illness and violent acts). To our knowledge there has been one previous peer reviewed study that examined updating of beliefs regarding a future positive life event (Wiswall & Zafar, 2015). That study revealed that people update beliefs to a greater extent in response to evidence suggesting they are likely to earn more than they thought, relative to evidence suggesting they are likely to earn less. While that study suggests that optimistic updating of beliefs is indeed observed for positive life events, it is unknown whether biased updating for positive life events is greater, smaller, or equal than for negative life events. As unrealistic optimism consists both of overestimating the likelihood of positive events and underestimating the likelihood of negative events (Sharot, 2011; Weinstein, 1980), the question of whether the same mechanism underlies both types of events equally is important for understanding optimism.

Here, we first describe two potential methodological pitfalls in studying updating for positive and negative life events utilizing the belief update task. We then proceed to present the results of the current study, which avoids such pitfalls.

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