pessimistic explanatory style

(noun)

A worldview in which people generally blame themselves for negative events, believe that such events will continue indefinitely, and let such events affect many aspects of their lives.

Related Terms

Examples of pessimistic explanatory style in the following topics:

  • Attitude and Health

    • Related to this, research has shown that people with a pessimistic explanatory style are more likely to suffer from depression and stress, have weakened immune systems, be more vulnerable to minor ailments (like a cold or fever) and major illnesses (such as heart attacks or cancer), and have a less effective recovery from health problems.
    • Examine the impacts of different attitudes and explanatory styles on health

  • Attribution

    • To do this, we make either explanatory or interpersonal attributions.
    • An explanatory attribution is an attempt to understand the world and seek reasons for a particular event.
    • People with an optimistic explanatory style attribute positive events to global, stable, internal causes and negative events to specific, unstable, external causes.
    • The inverse is true for those with a pessimistic explanatory style: they attribute negative events to global, stable, internal causes and positive events to specific, unstable, external causes.

  • Mexican Muralism

    • Rivera’s works were utopian and idealist, Orozco’s were critical and pessimistic and the most radical were those of Siqueiros, heavily focused on a scientific future.  
    • Of the three artists, Rivera was the most traditional in terms of painting styles, drawing heavily from European modernism.
    • He originally painted this in bright colors in the European style, but modified it to more earthy tones to imitate indigenous murals.
    • Orozco also began with a European style of expression.
    • Orozco, one of the three great muralists of the 20th century, painted murals that were more critical and pessimistic that his peers.

  • Personality Characteristics Beneficial to Change

    • Researchers and scientists agree that optimism is highly correlated with psychological well-being, successful coping styles, and constructive problem-solving skills.
    • A classic optimist paradigm states that an optimist will view a glass of water to be half full while a pessimist will view the same glass to be half empty.

  • Writing in Different Academic Disciplines

    • Each genre has its own specific requirements in terms of style, content, and format.
    • Depending on the assignment, you might also write an analytical, explanatory, or persuasive paper in any of these fields for a popular or professional audience.

  • Classical Greek Theater

    • Compared to the works of Aeschylus, choruses in Sophocles’ plays did less explanatory work, shifting the focus to deeper character development and staged conflict.
    • In-depth assessment and critique of the styling of Middle Comedy is difficult, given the lack of complete bodies of work.
    • However, given the revival of this style in Sicily and Magna Graecia, it appears that the works of this period did have considerable widespread literary and social impact.
    • The style of New Comedy is comparable to what is contemporarily referred to as situation comedy or comedy of manners.

  • Introducing and Formatting Quotations

    • This graffiti-style quotation cites its source text and page number.