What Is The Negativity Bias and How Can it be Overcome?
Sometimes it is so hard to have a positive mindset, right? Did you know that our brains are actually wired to think negatively! It's true, back in the day when our entire species lived in caves, and survival was the name of the game, we needed to be particularly sensitive to dangers, losses, and conflicts, in order to increase our chances of survival.
The reason for this is that negative events have a greater impact on our brains than positive ones. Psychologists refer to this as the negative bias (also called the negativity bias), and it can have a powerful effect on your behaviour, your decisions, and even your relationships.
While we may no longer need to be on constant high alert as our early ancestors needed to be in order to survive, the negativity bias still has a starring role in how our brains operate. Research has shown that negative bias can have a wide variety of effects on how people think, respond, and feel.
Some of the everyday areas where you might feel the results of this bias include in your relationships, decision-making, and the way you perceive people.
The negativity bias can have a profound effect on your relationships. The bias might lead people to expect the worst in others, particularly in close relationships in which people have known each other for a long time. For example, you might negatively anticipate how your partner will react to something and go into the interaction with your defences already on high alert. Arguments and resentment are often the results.
When it comes to relationships, it is valuable to remember that negative comments usually carry much more weight than positive ones. Being aware of our own tendency to fixate on the negative is also important. By understanding this natural human tendency, you can focus on finding ways to cut other people a break and to stop expecting the worst.
The negative bias can have an influence on the decision-making process. In their famous work, Nobel Prize-winning researchers Kahneman and Tversky found that when making decisions, people consistently place greater weight on negative aspects of an event than they do on positive ones.
So, the brain evolved a negativity bias that to this day constantly scans for bad news and reacts intensely to it by shutting off the outside world and narrowing in on the danger at large. But research shows that conversely, positive emotions (such as joy, amusement, happiness, serenity, gratitude and inspiration) and a positive mindset, actually expands our peripheral vision which in turn enhances our ability to take in more of our surroundings, connect the dots and appreciate the bigger picture.
How To Overcome the Bias?
Self-Awareness and Challenging Negative Self-Talk
By checking up on yourself throughout the day, you can start to recognize any thoughts that are running through your mind – both helpful and unhelpful ones. You can also look at your own behaviours too, for a better understanding of what’s serving you and what isn’t.
What were you thinking before experiencing anger, resentment, or frustration? Was it negativity bias in action, perhaps? And how can you replace those thoughts with more positive ones?
Cognitive Restructuring
Negativity biases have been linked to numerous psychological disorders, such as depression and anxiety (Riskind, 1997). When you catch yourself taking a negative view of situations, it often helps to practice cognitive restructuring by reframing the event or experience.
Savour the Positive Moments
When you stop and take some time to ‘drink in’ a positive experience, you’re savouring it and creating memories for the future. Building up your store of positive mental images and feelings helps you address the imbalance that negativity bias predisposes us to.
The next time you experience or create a positive moment, take a little longer than you usually would to enjoy it. Engage fully in the good sensations, happy thoughts, and pleasant emotions that you feel and make a note of what you enjoyed about it. When you go home, why not reflect on what just happened and turn the savouring skill into a habit?
Mindfulness: Breathing, Meditations, and More
Practising mindfulness is one good way to become more attuned to your own emotions. Through guided meditations, reflection, and other mindfulness interventions, you can start to observe your feelings and thoughts more objectively.
Even more promising evidence comes from a 2011 study by authors Kiken and Shook, who found an increase in positive judgments and higher levels of optimism when participants practised mindful breathing.
The negativity bias can have a powerful impact on your behaviour, but being aware of it means that you can take steps to adopt a more positive outlook on life. Taking a more mindful approach that involves being aware of your own tendency toward negativity and consciously elevating happier thoughts to the forefront of awareness—this is one of the best ways to combat negative bias.
Further still, because this positive mindset broadens our sense of possibilities and opens our minds, we are then able to build new skills and develop resources that can provide value for us in other areas of our life. And what’s more, evidence shows that people who meditate daily display more positive emotions than those who do not.
HOW INBLOOM HELPS LEADERS LEAD WITH WELLBEING FIRST
At In Bloom, we are helping leaders have a better understanding as to what their wellbeing looks like, holistically. We do this within partnership with the Global Leadership Wellbeing Survey. This is the first step of our Leadership Wellbeing Coaching journey.
Reference:
https://positivepsychology.com/3-steps-negativity-bias/