Taylor and Brown (1988) then went on to review a great deal of social cognition research ultimately concluding that “contrary to much traditional, psychological wisdom… the mentally healthy person appears to have the enviable capacity to distort reality in a direction that enhances self-esteem, maintains beliefs in personal efficacy, and promotes an optimistic view of the future” (p.204).[1] Indeed, it was Taylor and Brown (1988) who went on to suggest the term “positive illusions” which they defined as the “pervasive tendency to see oneself in the best possible light” (Peterson, 2006 p.117).[2]
Taylor and Brown (1988) defined positive illusions as “unrealistically positive self-evaluations, exaggerated perceptions of control and unrealistic optimism” (p. 194). They believe that these illusions are maintained through biases in encoding, interpretation and retrieval of information (i.e. selective attention and benign forgetting), cognitive drift (whereby beliefs change temporarily and then “drift” back to their original state), acknowledging pockets of incompetence (i.e. accepting a lack of talent in certain areas of life while maintaining belief in a general competence) and negative self-schemata which enable people to simply avoid situations in which they lack talent – in other words they construct a self enhancing world in which to live (Taylor and Brown, 1988).
Taylor (1989) argues that there are a range of benefits to be gained from these positive illusions and argues that they are related to (and indeed foster) happiness, the ability to care for others, creative and productive work (through increasing motivation, creativity and the ability to develop relevant skills), the ability to function under stress, physical health and the ability to cope with trauma.[3] Building on this, much recent research has emphasised the benefits of positive illusions in relationships. For example, Murray and Holmes (1997) found that “positive partner illusions predicted greater satisfaction, love and trust (as well as less conflict and ambivalence) in both dating and marital relationships” (Swami and Furnham, 2008 p. 3).[4]
[1] Taylor, S. E. and Brown, J. D. (1988). Illusion and well-being. A social psychological perspective on mental health. Psychological Bulletin, 103, 193-210.
[2] Peterson C. (2006). A primer in positive psychology. New York: Oxford University Press.
[3] Taylor, S. E. (1989) Positive Illusions; Creative Self-deception and the Healthy Mind. USA: Basic Books
[4] Swami, V. and Furnham, A. (2008) Is love really so blind? The Psychologist, 21 (2), 108-111
Source: Simmons, J. (2015). Just how positive are positive illusions? Positive Psychology UK. Moscow: MSK Filanco
