Download Positivity: Top-Notch Research Reveals the 3 to 1 Ratio That Will Change Your Life

Positivity: Top-Notch Research Reveals the 3 to 1 Ratio That Will Change Your Life Paperback

Author: Visit Amazon's Barbara Fredrickson Page | Language: English | ISBN: 0307393747 | Format: PDF, EPUB

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Download Positivity: Top-Notch Research Reveals the 3 to 1 Ratio That Will Change Your Life
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From Publishers Weekly

Positive psychology pioneer Fredrickson introduces readers to the power of harnessing happiness to transform their lives, backed up by impressive lab research. The author lays out the core truths and 10 forms of positivity—joy, gratitude, serenity, interest, hope, pride, amusement, inspiration, awe and love—in a book that promises to change the way people look at feeling good. Disdainful of Pollyannaism, Fredrickson remains realistic in her treatment and provides scientific evidence to illustrate her findings that maintaining a 3:1 positivity ratio of positive thoughts to negative emotions creates a tipping point between languishing and flourishing. The book includes compelling case studies, concrete tips, a Positivity Self Test and a tool kit for decreasing negativity and raising the positivity ratio. Although many of Fredrickson's methods and theories (notes on meditation and karma) will seem familiar to anyone versed in yoga or eastern religions, the scientific foundation of her arguments and additional online resources (www.positivityratio.com) offer readers a chance to experiment with positivity and very possibly lead richer lives. (Feb.)
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Review

"Written by one of the most influential contributors to this new perspective in science, Positivity provides a wonderful synthesis of what positive psychology has accomplished in the first decade of its existence. It is full of deep insights about human behavior as well as useful suggestions for how to apply them in everyday life."
—Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Ph.D., author of Flow

"Positivity is literally the feel-good book of the year, providing a scientifically sound prescription for joy, health, and creativity. Read one to two chapters daily as needed or until grumpiness subsides."
—Daniel Gilbert, professor of psychology, Harvard University, and author of Stumbling on Happiness


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• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Harmony; 1 edition (December 29, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0307393747
• ISBN-13: 978-0307393746
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)

Okay, don't get me wrong: I'm not a grumpy sourpuss intent on raining on the parade of Positive Psychology books published in recent years. I'm actually a mental health professional, a big fan of positive psychology, and I offer workshops to people on bringing positive psychology principles and tools into their lives. Fredrickson is an accomplished researcher, and her writing is pleasing at times. However, her main thesis (that we should strive to experience 3 positive emotions for every 1 negative emotion) is vague and impractical, and her recommendations for how to do so are better and more comprehensively stated elsewhere (such as in Martin Seligman's Authentic Happines or his more recent work, Flourishing). Given the avalanche of positive psychology books raining down on the unsuspecting public nowadays, one must be discerning in which ones to read and purchase, and while this is not a bad book, I didn't find it to be the most helpful or well-written one - especially in contrast to Seligman's magnum opus "Flourishing", which was, unfortunately for Fredrickson, published at nearly the same time.

The strength of the book is in the early section, where the author explains her theory of positive and negative emotions, and describes her list of the 10 positive emotions that we would all benefit from having more of in our lives. Fredrickson asserts that negative emotions aid human survival by narrowing and limiting what we perceive as our range of actions, while positive emotions aid survival by "broadening and building" our options for actions. For example, the negative emotion of "fear" of, say, a predator, limits our idea of possible actions to "run for your life".

There is an area of research and investigation in the field of psychology that is called the "positive psychology movement". For many years, psychologists studied what was wrong with people. They investigated aberrant behavior and psychological disorders. You might say they studied those who were emotionally unhealthy. That's what seemed to make the most sense to those working in the field. But somewhere along the way someone asked a pretty good question: "Hey, what if we studied healthy people? What if we investigated those who were emotionally healthy and happy and well adjusted?"

Seems like a pretty good idea, doesn't it?

The basic thought is: instead of just trying to figure out what's wrong with people who are emotionally unhealthy, maybe there would be value in trying to figure out what's right with people who are emotionally healthy. Maybe that information would be really helpful to us. In fact, it might even be more helpful!

Thus began the positive psychology movement. (Well, its beginnings were probably a little more complicated than that, but you get the picture.) One of the pioneers of the movement was Martin Seligman who published the oft-cited, best-selling, "Learned Optimism". Barbara L. Fredrickson is now considered to be one of the leading researchers in this movement and she presents many of the interesting and helpful results of her research in "Positivity".

A person might be tempted to think that this is pop psychology by untrained lay persons who tell lots of "feel-good" stories and encourage people to say "I'm feeling fantastic" all day long. That's not the case. This is not about having a "Positive Mental Attitude", Matt Foley style.

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