The DOI matches its Crossref record; 16 of the 16 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
The Theory Behind the Age-Related Positivity Effect
Open accessAbstract
The "positivity effect" refers to an age-related trend that favors positive over negative stimuli in cognitive processing. Relative to their younger counterparts, older people attend to and remember more positive than negative information. Since the effect was initially identified and the conceptual basis articulated (Mather and Carstensen, 2005) scores of independent replications and related findings have appeared in the literature. Over the same period, a number of investigations have failed to observe age differences in the cognitive processing of emotional material. When findings are considered in theoretical context, a reliable pattern of evidence emerges that helps to refine conceptual tenets. In this article we articulate the operational definition and theoretical foundations of the positivity effect and review the empirical evidence based on studies of visual attention, memory, decision making, and neural activation. We conclude with a discussion of future research directions with emphasis on the conditions where a focus on positive information may benefit and/or impair cognitive performance in older people.
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Cites
Baumeister, R. F., Bratslavsky, E., Finkenauer, C., & Vohs, K. D. (2001) · Review of General Psychology · doi:10.1037/1089-2680.5.4.323 · Cited by 7,678
Taking time seriously: A theory of socioemotional selectivity.
Carstensen, L. L., Isaacowitz, D. M., & Charles, S. T. (1999) · American Psychologist · doi:10.1037//0003-066x.54.3.165 · Cited by 5,377 · cited 1×
“The positivity effect was initially identified by investigating postulates of SST, a life-span theory of motivation (Carstensen, 1993, 2006; Carstensen et al., 1999).”
BackgroundSelf-citationNegativity Bias, Negativity Dominance, and Contagion
Rozin, P., & Royzman, E. B. (2001) · Personality and Social Psychology Review · doi:10.1207/s15327957pspr0504_2 · Cited by 4,342
The Influence of a Sense of Time on Human Development
Carstensen, L. L. (2006) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.1127488 · Cited by 2,554
Self-citationAging and motivated cognition: the positivity effect in attention and memory
Mather, M., & Carstensen, L. L. (2005) · Trends in Cognitive Sciences · doi:10.1016/j.tics.2005.08.005 · Cited by 1,910 · cited 1×
“Since the effect was initially identified and the conceptual basis articulated (Mather and Carstensen, 2005) scores of independent replications and related findings have appeared in the literature.”
BackgroundSelf-citationAffective picture processing: The late positive potential is modulated by motivational relevance
Schupp, H. T., Cuthbert, B. N., Bradley, M. M., Cacioppo, J. T., Ito, T., & Lang, P. J. (2000) · Psychophysiology · doi:10.1111/1469-8986.3720257 · Cited by 1,361
Emotional experience improves with age: Evidence based on over 10 years of experience sampling
Carstensen, L. L., Turan, B., Scheibe, S., Ram, N., Ersner-Hershfield, H., Samanez-Larkin, G. R., Brooks, K. P., & Nesselroade, J. R. (2011) · Psychology and Aging · doi:10.1037/a0021285 · Cited by 1,223 · cited 1×
“Despite abundant evidence that older people are both relatively more selective (Charles and Carstensen, 2010) and experience a relatively positive balance of emotions in daily life (Carstensen et al., 2011), a causal link between selective exposure and emotional well-being has not been established.”
BackgroundSelf-citationChartrand, T. L., & Bargh, J. A. (1996) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037//0022-3514.71.3.464 · Cited by 897
Aging and attentional biases for emotional faces
Mather, M., & Carstensen, L. L. (2003) · Psychological Science · doi:10.1111/1467-9280.01455 · Cited by 808
Self-citationGrandmothers and the evolution of human longevity
Hawkes, K. (2003) · American Journal of Human Biology · doi:10.1002/ajhb.10156 · Cited by 582
Cited by
Differences in negativity bias underlie variations in political ideology
Hibbing, J. R., Smith, K. B., & Alford, J. R. (2014) · Behavioral and Brain Sciences · doi:10.1017/s0140525x13001192 · Cited by 608
Socioemotional Selectivity Theory: The Role of Perceived Endings in Human Motivation
Carstensen, L. L. (2021) · The Gerontologist · doi:10.1093/geront/gnab116 · Cited by 573
Self-citationThe positivity effect: a negativity bias in youth fades with age
Carstensen, L. L., & DeLiema, M. (2018) · Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences · doi:10.1016/j.cobeha.2017.07.009 · Cited by 359
Self-citationThomas, M. L., Kaufmann, C. N., Palmer, B. W., Depp, C. A., Martin, A. S., Glorioso, D. K., Thompson, W. K., & Jeste, D. V. (2016) · The Journal of Clinical Psychiatry · doi:10.4088/jcp.16m10671 · Cited by 225
Geiger, P. J., Boggero, I. A., Brake, C. A., Caldera, C. A., Combs, H. L., Peters, J. R., & Baer, R. A. (2016) · Mindfulness · doi:10.1007/s12671-015-0444-1 · Cited by 205
Metadata
- Authors
- Reed, A. E., & Carstensen, L. L.
- Venue
- Frontiers in Psychology
- Publisher
- Frontiers Media SA
- Published
- 2012
- Volume
- 3
- Pages
- 339-339
- ISSN
- 1664-1078 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2045196028
- Cited by
- 766
- References
- 16
- FWCI
- 54.49
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
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Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
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