[tips] Seligman's Explanatory Style

[Britt, Michael]

One of my favorite theories (which has now found a home in the  
"positive psychology" movement) is Seligman's ideas regarding the  
effects of your explanatory style (especially in your reaction to  
negative events) on your mood.  In the early days he talked about a  
negative style as one that is Internal ("I'm stupid!"), Stable ("I'll  
never get this!") and Global ("I'm going to fail at other things as  
well!").  Recently in his more popular books I see that he has changed  
these terms to Personal, Persistent and Pervasive.  Whatever you call  
them, I rather like the whole theory and certainly think it's worth  
teaching at the introductory level.  I checked a couple of intro books  
and to my surprise I found very little in-depth coverage of these  
ideas.   I found explanatory style covered briefly in the Personality  
chapter, and then in the Stress chapters of two other intro books.   
Too bad - for such a useful theory.  Why do you think it doesn't get  
more exposure?  Too much material to cover in one book I suppose.

Michael
Michael Britt
mich...@thepsychfiles.com
www.thepsychfiles.com




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