A very interesting topic thanks. I'd suggest looking at these two papers which each compare hope and optimism:

Bailey, T. C., Eng, W., Frisch, M. B., & Snyder, C. (2007). Hope and optimism as related to life satisfaction. The Journal of Positive Psychology, 2(3), 168-175. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17439760701409546

Bruininks, P., & Malle, B. (2005). Distinguishing Hope from Optimism and Related Affective States. Motivation and Emotion, 29(4), 324-352. doi: 10.1007/s11031-006-9010-4

Regards

Sue

A possible distinction between hope and optimism, is that hope has two compounds empowerment, which means the sense of efficacy and adequate psychological resources like motivation etc. and pathways, denoting that the person have a plan for reaching a preferred scenario in the future in general or in a specific area like employment. Optimism, on the other hand is more generic and does not necessarily refer to a specific preferred scenario.

Thank you for that, would that then mean that hope has a closer relationship with action than optimism? Referring to the examples of pathways. In turn does this mean that optimism is more passive?

In my conception, yes. An example to pathways would be: a high school student knows how to study, to excel in which tasks, the processes he will undergo in a clear and realistic way, he is strong in pathways dimension of hope, but his motivation and sense of efficacy would be the empowerment dimension.

Thank you for that, you have given me a new avenue to explore with regard to my own research on Coping Strategies. Much appreciated. If you have any specific references you would recommend I look over that would be fabulous also. One more thing, just to clarify would hope and optimism be confounding variables in studies? Any recommendations for managing this if they are.

I guess, they may have multicollinearity problems in certain samples, imho, this of course depends on the instruments you choose for your certain population. Some references I encountered:

"A widely recognised definition of optimism is: ‘a mood or attitude associated with an expectation about the social or material future, one which the evaluator regards as socially desirable, to his or her advantage, or for his or her pleasure’ (Tiger 1979, as cited in Peterson, 2006)."

Peterson, C. (2000). The Future of Optimism. American Psychologist, 55 (1), 44-55.

Peterson, C. (2006). A primer in positive psychology. New York: Oxford University Press.

For a speficific instance of hope,

HONG, P. Y. P., POLANIN, J.R., & PIGOTT, T.D. (2012). Validation of the Employment Hope Scale: Measuring Psychological Self-Sufficiency Among Low-Income Jobseekers. Research on Social Work Practice, 22(3), 323-332.

Hope and optimism are actually often talked about in tandem, both as personal resources. Not sure if this can help for your current research, but in quite a lot of studies of employee wellbeing the concept of Psychological Capital (PsyCap) has been used. In these studies, hope and optimism are mostly seen as two concepts that share many similarities. That is, hope, optimism, self-efficacy, and resilience are framed as personal resources that can increase employee wellbeing. Hope that helps.

Thank you, like with all research every avenue to explore helps! I shall see if I can find the PsyCap assessment tool to see what exactly they are measuring. Thank you.

No problem. Your best chances are to search for work of Avey and Luthans. Other resarchers have used these concepts as well (e.g., Ouweneel) so it should be quite easy to find some information on this topic. Good luck!

Thank you.

As wishful thinking and staying, there is a case to remain in optimism. In that case, is there the solution to a risk to occur ? For example, how the method to control the emotion of the optimism tendency?

I think that there is an association between optimism and a human mistake.

Thanks.

Hi Yasuko, if I am reading that right are you saying that optimism requires there to be an action an event occurring? therefore action must be present for their to be optimism? secondly could there be the same argument for hope, perhaps even more so that hope has a relationship with a human mistake? just wanted to clarify. Thank you for your input.

Dear Merisa Bradley

Thank you for your comment.

I think that, as a motive of the actions ( against hope or purpose ), an action event occurs at first.

However for example, in the process of the achievement against hope and a purpose, it becomes perfunctory or the motivation tends to fall down.

The person has the case, that is sometimes optimistic about a problem under such situation.

For example, they continue being given a moderate reward, and motivation emotion against original hope are lost. In this optimistic sense, human error and a mistake may occur.

I am sorry, but I will not mention to religion, but I think whether we cannot prevent the emotion including such a risk mentally.

Sincerely.

Yasuko

A very interesting topic thanks. I'd suggest looking at these two papers which each compare hope and optimism:

Bailey, T. C., Eng, W., Frisch, M. B., & Snyder, C. (2007). Hope and optimism as related to life satisfaction. The Journal of Positive Psychology, 2(3), 168-175. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17439760701409546

Bruininks, P., & Malle, B. (2005). Distinguishing Hope from Optimism and Related Affective States. Motivation and Emotion, 29(4), 324-352. doi: 10.1007/s11031-006-9010-4

Regards

Sue

Perfect, thank you very much Sue. It really is an intriguing topic. I shall get hold of both of those. Merisa

Dear Sue Ferguson

Thank you for the introduce of the journal. But, I can not have a credit card.

So, I am sorry, but I cannot purchase a journal.

Thanks.

Yasuko

Articles were much insightful and clear, and helped me so much, and enriched my understanding on the concepts.

By the way,

Dear Yasuko,

I have acessed the two articles by "googling" the titles, without a library subscription for free, you can also try that.

Hi Sue, i have just had a chance to look over distinguishing hope from optimism. I find it very interesting that low level personal control was directly linked to hope. It will be very interesting tracking that in my own study. Similarly it would be very interesting to see studies on links between the impact of religion / spirituality & atheism on the moralistic rule with regard to hope! Very interesting. Looking forward to reading the other paper too.

Here are some more references thay may prove useful to you. These studies mainly focus on the role of positive emotions in organizational behavior, and the concepts of hope and optimism are also discussed. Specifically, the Broaden & Build theory of Frederickson may be helpful as it specifically states that positive emotions (like hope and optimism) can be part of a process in which positive emotions and wellbeing can increase each other in so-called gain cycles. Maybe not specifically focused on the difference between hope and optimism, but the two concepts do play an important role here.

Avey, J.B., Wernsing, T.S., & Luthans, F. (2008). Can positive employees help positive organizational change? Impact of psychological capital and emotions on relevant attitudes and behaviors. Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 44, 48-70

Fredrickson, B.L. (2001). The role of positive emotions in positive psychology: The broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions. American Psychologist, 56, 218-226.

Fredrickson, B.L., Cohn, M.A., Coffey, K.A., Pek, J., & Finkel, S.M. (2008). Open hearts build lives: Positive emotions, induced through loving-kindness meditation, build consequential personal resources. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 95, 1045-10

Gray, E., & Watson, D. (2001). Emotion, mood, temperament: Similarities, differences and a synthesis. In R.L. Payne & C.L. Cooper (Eds.), Emotions at Work: Theory, Research and Applications for Management (pp. 21-44). Chichester, UK: Wiley and Sons.

Excellent, thank you. The more the merrier i shall work through them also. Thanks again for all your guidance. Merisa.

Merisa, I recommend the following readings; they are quite recent and the paper by Alarcon et al. is particularly useful for distinguishing the two constructs.

Alarcon, G. M., Bowling, N. A., & Khazon, S. (2013). Great expectations: A meta-analytic examination of optimism and hope. Personality and Individual Differences, 54(7), 821-827. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2012.12.004

Reichard, R. J., Avey, J. B., Lopez, S., & Dollwet, M. (2013). Having the will and finding the way: A review and meta-analysis of hope at work. The Journal of Positive Psychology, 8(4), 292-304. doi: 10.1080/17439760.2013.800903

Hope is a desire for something or some act to be done in favor of someone, and it is more related to heart and wish ; whereas Optimism is a mental attitude to keep doing confidently and hopefully to expect the most favorable or the best possible outcome. Optimistic hope is a realistic approach.

'Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope and confidence'......Helen Keller

Be hopeful optimistically and achievement is your!

Agree with Dr Tariq

Both are the two sides of the same coin.