The moment anyone enters this world, they’re taught that happiness is an eternal goal you strive for. Happiness is key and leads to all kinds of great things. For example, people who are optimistic and positive tend to be viewed as more attractive by others around them. Seems like a pretty simple concept since no one wants to be with a 24/7 Debbie downer. While all the health and social benefits may prove true for happy people, they do have a down side according to researchers: they tend to overestimate their ability to read others’ negative emotions. The ability to understand and share the feelings of others is also known as empathy.
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A recent article published in PLOS ONE looked at trait positive emotion and self-reported empathic ability versus actual. Happier people were able to detect shifts from negative to positive emotions in others but showed lowered accuracy when it came to detecting high intensity negative emotions. Researchers didn’t forget people who were not so cheery in nature (aka The Debbie downers) and also included them in the study for comparison. Turns out, less cheery people tended to get the details right and were able to better read emotions compared to happy people. They showed a more critical eye to detecting emotions.
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In particular, happy participants found it especially difficult to detect emotional tone of a highly negative monologue. Happier participants also tended to over rate their ability to be empathic.
So don’t look down on Debbie downers. They may be winning in the emotion recognition game after all and prove to be more empathic than most of us would think.
Amy Yew is a registered clinical counselor and relationship therapist. She is also the author of a fashion and lifestyle blog Style Du Jour. Tell us what you think and submit any questions you have to amyvancouvercourier@gmail.com.
