Issues of optimism and pessimism diagnostics in the context of dispositional optimism theory

Abstract

The historical and theoretical overview of scientific views on the nature of optimism and pessimism is presented. The ideas of the basic psychological topical approaches are summarized: optimism as an attributional style and optimism as a personal disposition. Psychodiagnostic issues of studying optimism and pessimism are considered. The results of the author's adaptation and modification of “Life orientation test” performed on a sample of subjects (N = 506) of adolescent and young age are presented.