Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, J. Behav. Dec.

Making (2014)
Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/bdm.1849

Self-specic Optimism Bias in Belief Updating Is Associated with High Trait

Optimism
BOJANA KUZMANOVIC1,2*, ANNELI JEFFERSON1,3 and KAI VOGELEY2,4
1
Ethics in the Neurosciences (INM-8), Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine, Research Center Juelich, Jlich, Germany
2
Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Hospital Cologne, Cologne, Germany
3
Department of Philosophy, Kings College London, London, UK
4
Cognitive Neuroscience (INM-3), Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine, Research Center Juelich, Jlich, Germany
ABSTRACT
People learn more from new information when it leads to favorable future outlooks and thus can maintain optimism despite conicting
evidence. In two studies (N = 20 and 26), we investigated whether this optimism bias in belief updating is self-specic by modifying a recently
introduced learning paradigm. In each trial, participants had to estimate the probability of experiencing a negative future event, were then
presented with the population base rate of that event, and were subsequently asked for a second, updated estimation. In half of the 88 trials
with varying events, estimations were made for oneself, in the other half for a similar other. We tested whether the updates (differences
between the rst and second estimates) following undesirable base rate were lower than those following desirable base rates, and whether this
difference was greater for self relative to other. In both studies, the overall results support the presence of a self-specic optimism bias in belief
updating. However, taking into account trait optimism (TO) as a moderator variable revealed that this was the case only in participants with
high TO, whereas those with low TO showed optimistic belief updating for both self and other. In Study 2, we additionally controlled for
possible misclassications of base rate desirability. Taken together, the optimism bias in belief updating was demonstrated by a selective
neglect of unfavorable information. A self-specic inuence of this bias in individuals with high TO may ultimately cause the impression
of a more positive future outlook relative to others. Copyright 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Additional supporting information may be found in the online version of this article at the publishers web-site.
key words

optimism bias; update; belief; learning; judgment

INTRODUCTION
Throughout our everyday life, we prospectively estimate the
likelihood of possible events and make decisions based on
these judgments. However, probability assessments do not represent an objective and formally realistic processing of available evidence but are inherently subjective and intuitive and
often systematically biased (Tversky & Kahneman, 1982a).
When we estimate our chances of experiencing desirable
events or our risk for adverse experiences, we tend to
overestimate the former and underestimate the latter, thereby
promoting optimistic future outlooks (Shepperd, Klein,
Waters, & Weinstein, 2013; Weinstein, 1980). This optimism
bias has been demonstrated to be prevalent in the whole
populationregardless of age, sex, education, and occupationand for a broad spectrum of domains including health,
nance, career, personal relationships, or self-evaluation
(Dunning, Meyerowitz, & Holzber, 1989; Weinstein, 1980,
1987). Critically, the manner in which lay people and experts
evaluate general and individual risk factors to assess probabilities has direct implications for efforts at personal, public, and
environmental protection (Slovic, Fischhoff, & Lichtenstein,
1982; Weinstein, 1987). For instance, crises in the nancial
markets may be critically promoted by systematic judgmental
limitations and optimism biases (Puri & Robinson, 2007;
Sharot, Korn, & Dolan, 2011).
*Correspondence to: Bojana Kuzmanovic, INM-8, Research Center Juelich,
52425 Jlich, Germany. E-mail: b.kuzmanovic@fz-juelich.de

Copyright 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Besides this everyday importance, the investigation of

judgments about ones own future offers insights into the nature of the experience of the self as a cognitiveaffective
agent (Carver, Scheier, & Segerstrom, 2010; Christoff,
Cosmelli, Legrand, & Thompson, 2011; DArgembeau,
Lardi, & Van der Linden, 2012). Because our perception of
the world is a synthetic process integrating sensations and
concepts and allowing for distorted views of reality, any insight into systematic features of this construction would be
informative for the fundamental function of self-referential
processing (Sturma, 2008). Here, it would be interesting to
see whether peoples optimism bias is specic for self-related
judgments relative to judgments about others (Slovic et al.,
1982). Moreover, the optimistic expectations toward the
future have been associated with critical effects on peoples
behavior and their affective and motivational states. For
instance, trait optimism has been associated with well-being
and persistence in trying to reach desired goals
(Carver et al., 2010; Nes & Segerstrom, 2006; Scheier,
Weintraub, & Carver, 1986), but also with the inhibition of
cautious behaviors (Carver et al., 2010; Puri & Robinson,
2007; Weinstein, 1987). Affective disorders accentuate these
interrelations between optimism, affect, and cognition, as
depressive symptoms often are accompanied by a pessimistic cognitive style (Alloy & Ahrens, 1987; Korn, Sharot,
Walter, Heekeren, & Dolan, 2014; Pyszczynski, Holt, &
Greenberg, 1987, but see also Dunning & Story, 1991),
whereas inated overcondence is characteristic for manic
episodes (Lardi Robyn, Ghisletta, & Van der Linden,

Journal of Behavioral Decision Making

2012). Thus, investigating whether self-related and otherrelated judgments are optimistically biased and how this
relates to trait optimism provides important insights into
human decision making and functioning.
Recently, a new method of assessing the optimism bias at
the individual level has targeted the question of how people
maintain optimism in the face of disconrming knowledge
(Sharot et al., 2011; but see also Alloy & Ahrens, 1987). When
people have to estimate their probability of experiencing adverse future events (e.g., suffering from depression), they tend
to adjust these estimates toward ofcial base rates signicantly
more when the rates are desirable (lower than expected) than
when they are undesirable (higher than expected). Here, the
critical measure is the difference between the rst and second
estimates (i.e., the update), and the optimism bias is dened
as the difference between participants belief updates after
being confronted with desirable and undesirable information,
respectively. Thus, neither the size of the initial estimates nor
that of the base rates, but whether the belief updating depended
on the desirability of the base rates, was crucial for the assessment of the optimism bias. Critically, this asymmetric updating
is not predicted by formal learning models, as these assume
that the amount of learning depends on the size of the
experienced prediction error (or in this case, the estimation
error, i.e., the difference between ones initial estimate and
the base rate; Garrison, Erdeniz, & Done, 2013).1
The present two studies aim to extend this new approach
of investigating the optimistic belief updating. In a modulated version of the update paradigm, participants had to
estimate the probability that an adverse event would occur
in the future, were then presented with the ofcial base rate
of this event occurring in the general population, and immediately afterwards were given the chance to revise their initial
estimation. Critically, we compared judgments referring to
self with those about others and additionally controlled and
counterbalanced the size of the estimation errors across
conditions by manipulating the presented base rates.
We tested whether the optimism bias in belief updating is
particularly pronounced in self-related judgments by
considering three related measures of updating: amount of
update, frequency of the base rate neglect (update = 0), and
the correlation between updates and estimation errors. We
hypothesized the following: (i) people would tend to update
less after undesirable than desirable new information; and
(ii) this effect would be stronger for judgments relating to
themselves than to others. Furthermore, we explored whether
trait optimism modulates the measured optimism bias in belief
updating by comparing task performances of participants scoring low and high on trait optimism. Study 2 tested whether the
optimism bias can be replicated after controlling for methodological problems relating to the subjective perception of
estimation errors dependent on personal vulnerabilities. Taken
together, the present work empirically contributes to the
further development of a novel method for studying optimism
at the individual level. Conceptually, it enables the
Learning refers to belief updating in response to new and conicting information (and not to the acquisition of new skills or knowledge, as this term
is usually used in everyday life).

Copyright 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

identication of mechanisms, which may explain the maintenance of optimism despite conicting evidence while taking
into account inter-individual differences in trait optimism.

STUDY 1: SELF-SPECIFICITY AND TRAIT OPTIMISM

IN OPTIMISTIC BELIEF UPDATING
Method
Participants
A total of 23 individuals were recruited online at the
Research Center Juelich, Germany. Three persons were
excluded from analyses, two because they suspected that
the base rates were not correct and one because of problems
with task execution. Data from 20 participants were included
in the analyses (mean age = 29.10 years, SD = 6.67, ranging
from 22 to 42; 12 women). All participants were nave with
respect to the specic purpose of the study, gave written
informed consent, and were paid for their participation. The
study was approved by the local ethics committee of the
Medical Faculty of the University of Cologne, Germany.

Stimulus material
We used 88 German descriptions of adverse life events as stimuli (see Supporting Information S1 for the full list). A wide
range of events relating to different life domains (e.g., arthritis,
unemployment, or pest infestation in the home) were included
and randomly assigned to the experimental conditions anew
for each participant in order to attain equal distributions of
event characteristics. Event characteristics that have been suggested to modulate the optimism bias include the base rate,
severity (or event valence), arousal, controllability, and personal experience (Rose, Endo, Windschitl, & Suls, 2008;
Weinstein, 1980, 1987). We tested for relations between event
characteristics and task performance to rule out that these
variables could constitute confounding variables.

Design and procedure

Study 1 included the update experiment, the stimulus evaluation task, a set of self-report questionnaires, and a nal
debrieng. The update experiment and the evaluation task
were carried out on a laptop (software Presentation, version
15.1, Neurobehavioral Systems, Inc., Berkeley, CA). Prior
to these two tasks, participants underwent a standardized,
computerized instruction including practice trials with
stimuli not used within the experimental tasks.
Update experiment. In the update experiment, participants
were asked to estimate the probability that different adverse
events would occur at least once in their lifetime. After the initial estimate was given, the participants were presented with
the corresponding base rate for the general population and
were then given the opportunity to adjust their initial estimate
(Figure 1). The successive presentation of the rst estimation,
the base rate, and the second estimation within one trial served
the purpose of minimizing possible memory effects.
J. Behav. Dec. Making (2014)
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B. Kuzmanovic et al.

Optimism Bias and Trait Optimism

Figure 1. Examples of experimental trials with varying adverse life events. (A) Condition self_p, self as target person, positive base rate: A
participant estimates his or her probability of suffering from arthritis at least once in a lifetime and is confronted with a lower and thus desirable
base rate. In addition, durations of single events in a trial are provided. (B) Condition other_n, other as target person, negative base rate: A
participant estimates the probability that a similar other will be unemployed at least once in a lifetime and is confronted with a higher and thus
undesirable base rate. Positive and negative base rates were generated by subtracting or adding varying values (maximal 25) from the rst estimate. Updates were computed as the difference between the rst and second estimates

Critical measures of participants behavior during this

task related to the extent of belief updating, that is, to the
difference between the rst and second estimates. The factors
that were expected to affect this update behavior were the
target person of the judgment (self vs. other) and the valence
of the base rates (positive vs. negative). The target person
was varied by instructing participants to make estimations
for themselves in half of the trials (self) and for a similar
other person of the same age, sex, and sociocultural background (other) in the other half of the trials (see Supporting
Information S2 for the complete instruction text). Because
it would be too difcult to control for compliance, we did
not specify whether the participants should think of a group
of similar people in general terms or of a specic similar person they know. The valence of the base rates of adverse life
events depended on participants rst estimate: When the
base rate for an adverse event was lower than the participants rst estimate, this constituted desirable (or positive)
information; when it was higher, this constituted undesirable
(or negative) information. Thus, a two-by-two design was
realized with the factors target person (self vs. other) and valence of the base rate (positive, p, vs. negative, n), resulting
in four conditions: self_p, self_n, other_p, and other_n.
Responses were given by adjusting the number displayed on
the screen to indicate an absolute probability from 1% to 99%
in a completely continuous manner. At the start of all rst
estimations, the number on the screen was 50%, and at the start
of all second estimations, participants rst estimate in the
respective trial was displayed. Participants could decrease or
increase the displayed number by using two buttons and
a conrmation button (left and right arrow and space on
the keyboard).
Participants were instructed that there was no right or
wrong answer as we were interested in their subjective judgment and to feel free to update their rst estimate as much
Copyright 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

as they wanted. However, they were also informed that the

population base rates were determined by the German
Federal Statistical Ofce (Statistisches Bundesamt) and
that they should consider this information during their
second estimation. Unbeknownst to participants, the base
rates were in fact systematically manipulated in order to
control the frequencies of positive and negative trials.
Positive and negative base rates were computed by
subtracting or adding varying values from the rst estimate,
independently of the value of the estimate. For each condition, we used the same 22 values ranging from 4 to 25 for
the base rate calculation (for more details, see Supporting
Information S3). Both the assignment of the different stimulus
events to the four conditions and the order of the trials were
randomized anew for each participant.
Because of the manipulated base rates and the increased
transparency of the design (rst estimation, base rate, and
second estimation presented within one trial), we took great
care to assess participants suspicions regarding the purpose
of the study by using the funnel debrieng method. Immediately after the update experiment, participants completed a
short debrieng, including ratings of task difculty on a
4-point rating scale (from difcult to not difcult). Furthermore, they had the opportunity to describe problems or
hypotheses regarding the task purpose by giving written
answers to open-ended questions (Did you have any
difculties during the experiment?; Did you notice
anything that appeared odd to you?; and Do you have any
speculation about the purpose of the experiment?). The investigator read the answers immediately and asked more specic
questions if there was any lack of clarity. Although participants
did have general speculations about the rationale of the experiment (e.g., how estimations about the future differ for oneself
and others) or reported that individual base rates were surprising, none of the participants included in the analyses had any
J. Behav. Dec. Making (2014)
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Journal of Behavioral Decision Making

specic guesses that would match the critical hypotheses of
the study or that would let them think that the base rates were
manipulated. In fact, none of the participants suspected that
the critical measure was the change in their estimate
dependent on the desirability of the new information. In
the nal debrieng at the very end of the procedure, participants were informed that the presented base rates had been
randomly manipulated and were, in fact, meaningless
values. Further, we explicitly explained the reasons for this
experimental procedure. Even after knowing all these
details, none of the participants declared that they had
suspected anything of relevance during the experiment.
Moreover, all participants declared that they were able to
understand the reasons for the procedure and that they did
not have any objections to it.
Stimulus evaluation and questionnaires. In the stimulus
evaluation task, participants assessed event characteristics
for each stimulus event that they had seen in the update experiment. The following characteristics were rated on 7-point
scales: event valence (from 1 = very negative to 7 = very positive), arousal (from 1 = very indifferent to 7 = very aroused),
controllability (from 1 = very uncontrollable to 7 = very
controllable), and personal experience (from 1 = unfamiliar
to 7 = currently experiencing; see Supporting Information S2
for the complete instruction text). After the stimulus evaluation,
the following self-report questionnaires (German versions)
were completed: the Life Orientation Test (LOT-R, Glaesmer,
Hoyer, Klotsche, & Herzberg, 2008), the Beck Depression
Inventory (Beck & Steer, 1987), and the StateTrait Anxiety
Inventory (Laux, Glanzmann, Schaffner, & Spielberger, 1970).

Measures
For each participant, all three experimental measures were
computed separately for each of the four conditions (self_p,
self_n, other_p, and other_n). First, updates were dened as
the differences between the rst and second estimates in each
trial. When the base rate was lower than the rst estimate, it
was expected that the estimate would tend to be adjusted
toward this lower value; thus, update = rst estimate second
estimate. Conversely, when the base rate was higher than the
rst estimate, higher second estimates were expected; thus,
update =second estimate rst estimate. Second, in order to
obtain a measure for the amount of the categorical neglect of
the presented base rates, the percentage of trials with no
difference between the rst and second estimates (update = 0,
update0) was computed. And nally, in order to take into
account predictions of formal learning theories that the amount
of learning should depend on the error size (Garrison et al.,
2013), Pearsons correlation coefcients between the update
and the estimation error (update_error) were calculated.
In order to obtain inter-individual measures of the strength
of the optimism bias, we computed the difference between
the mean update for positive and negative trials, separately
for self and other and individually for each participant.
Thus, the self-related optimism bias (biasself) was computed
as biasself = mean updateself_p mean updateself_n; the otherrelated optimism bias (biasother) was computed as
Copyright 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

biasother = mean updateother_p mean updateother_n; and the

differential optimism bias was computed as biasself_other =
biasself biasother. These three bias measures were used to
test for correlations with self-report questionnaire scores.
Although this learning paradigm focuses on estimation updates and not on the sizes of absolute estimates per se, we also
provide data on mean rst estimates for self-related and otherrelated risks (1stestimself and 1stestimother). These data basically
serve as a reference to prior research, in which the unrealistic
comparative optimism has been demonstrated by lower risk
estimates for oneself than for others (Shepperd et al., 2013),
and are briey discussed in the General Discussion and
Conclusions (for both Studies 1 and 2).
The self-report questionnaires were used to measure
relevant characteristics of the sample: LOT-R, trait optimism
on a scale from 0 (pessimistic) to 24 (optimistic); Beck
Depression Inventory, symptoms of depression on a scale
from 0 (minimal) to 63 (maximal); and StateTrait Anxiety
Inventory, trait and state anxiety, respectively, on a scale
from 20 (minimal) to 80 (maximal). However, we did not
use the depression and anxiety scores for correlations with
measures of optimism bias because of the low variance of
these scores within the samples (Table 2). In both studies,
the participants were recruited from the general population
and reported symptoms only at a subclinical level.

Statistical analyses
All analyses were conducted using SPSS (IBM SPSS
Advanced Statistics 20.0, International Business Machines
Corporation, Armonk, NY). In order to test for an optimism
bias within the update experiment, we conducted a multivariate,
repeated-measures analysis of variance (rmANOVA) with
within-subject independent variables, target person (self vs.
other) and valence (positive vs. negative), and three dependent
variables, update, update0, and update_error. Self-related
and other-related mean rst estimates were compared by
using the dependent t-test. Pearsons correlation coefcient
was used as an effect size measure (all F-values had one
degree of freedom).
In order to test for relationships between the optimism bias
values (biasself, biasother, and biasself_other) and trait optimism,
Spearmans correlation coefcients (rs) were calculated because questionnaire scores represent ordinal variables. We expected that biasself and biasself_other would positively correlate
with trait optimism (one-tailed testing), but we did not have
any hypotheses about the relationship between biasother and
LOT-R scores (two-tailed testing).
The alpha level of .05 was used for all statistical tests. We
adjusted this threshold for multiple comparisons for the
three correlation analyses by using the Bonferroni correction
(p = .050/3 = .017). Furthermore, events that were experienced at the moment of participation (e.g., when a participant was already suffering from hay fever and had to
estimate the likelihood of suffering from hay fever) were
excluded from all analyses when they occurred in self-trials
by using the ratings of personal experience (rating currently
affected; Supporting Information S2).
J. Behav. Dec. Making (2014)
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B. Kuzmanovic et al.

Optimism Bias and Trait Optimism

across all conditions for the three dependent variables were
as follows: update, M = 5.83 (2.79); update0, M = 30.97
(22.89); and update_error, M = 0.58 (0.25).
Importantly, the two measures update and update0 are not
redundant in the sense that a greater amount of zero updates
fully explains the lower mean updates. We repeated the
analysis of mean updates under exclusion of trials with
zero updates and could replicate all effects, including the
interaction effect, F(1, 19) = 11.87, p = .003.
Mean rst estimates were lower for judgments relating to
self (M = 28.82, SD = 17.63) than other (M = 37.25,
SD = 15.90), t(19) = 5.83, p = .000, r = .80.

Results
Update experiment
The effects of target person and valence of new information
on mean update, update0, and update_error are presented in
Table 1 and Figure 2. The results for these three dependent
variables relating to the amount of learning were fully comparable. The signicant main effect of target person indicates
that belief updating was generally greater during judgments
about others relative to those about oneself. The main effect
of valence shows that participants generally updated less in
response to undesirable than desirable information. And
nally, the signicant interaction effect demonstrates that
this effect of decreased undesirable updating was stronger
in self-related than in other-related judgments. In accordance,
pairwise comparisons revealed signicant differences between positive and negative trials for self, but not for other.
The overall means (with standard deviations in parentheses)

Biases and questionnaire scores

Table 2 shows descriptive statistics of individual scores on
optimism bias measures and self-report questionnaires.

Table 1. Effects of target person and valence of new information on three measures of belief updating from Study 1: mean update,
categorical resistance to update (update0), and correlation between update and estimation error (update_error)
Source

SD

F/t

4.61/6.59
6.87/4.79

2.44/1.67
2.18/1.93

17.26**
18.61**
12.41**

.001
.000
.002

.69
.70

6.65/3.32
7.10/6.24

3.01/2.31
1.88/2.26

5.16**
1.56

.000
.135

.46
.28

40.39/23.42
23.64/38.20

19.09/15.78
16.42/18.21

20.96**
13.29**
8.78**

.000
.002
.008

.72
.64

26.33/50.56
20.85/26.13

20.73/24.43
15.52/18.78

3.64**
1.77

.002
.094

.40
.29

0.42/0.67
0.67/0.46

0.18/0.18
0.17/0.14

30.83**
26.41**
6.21*

.000
.000
.022

.79
.76

0.62/0.34
0.72/0.64

0.19/0.21
0.20/0.21

4.65**
1.82

.000
.084

.44
.30

Mean update
Target person: self/other
Valence: p/n
Target person valence
Pairwise comparisons
Self_p/self_n
Other_p/other_n
Update0 (%)
Target person: self/other
Valence: p/n
Target person valence
Pairwise comparisons
Self_p/self_n
Other_p/other_n
Update_error (r)
Target person: self/other
Valence: p/n
Target person valence
Pairwise comparisons
Self_p/self_n
Other_p/other_n

All dfs were 1, 19. _p and _n, positive and negative valence of base rates.
*p < .05,
**p < .01.

Figure 2. Results of Study 1 demonstrating optimistically biased updating in self-referential risk estimations based on three measures: mean
updates (left), the categorical resistance to update (update = 0, middle), and the correlation between the update and the estimation error (i.
e., the difference between the rst estimate and the base rate; update_error, right). All measures show that belief updating was lower in response to undesirable base rates and that this effect was greater for judgments relating to oneself than to similar others. Error bars show
95% condence interval

Copyright 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

J. Behav. Dec. Making (2014)

DOI: 10.1002/bdm

Journal of Behavioral Decision Making

Table 2. Descriptive statistics of optimism bias measures and questionnaire scores from Studies 1 and 2
Study 1, N = 20
Min/max
Biasself
Biasother
Biasself_other
Trait optimism, LOT-R
Depression symptoms, BDI
State anxiety, STAI1
Trait anxiety, STAI2

1.21/8.28
4.17/5.86
2.24/12.45
13/24
0/11
26/48
26/49

Study 2, N = 26
M (SD)
3.34 (2.89)
0.86 (2.46)
2.48 (3.15)
17.95 (2.61)
3.75 (3.14)
33.25 (5.89)
32.20 (7.54)

Min/max
1.88/6.52
8.17/6.57
5.81/9.76
10/23
0/16
24/56
32/58

M (SD)
2.60 (2.50)
0.70 (3.31)
1.90 (3.51)
17.15 (3.79)
5.15 (3.99)
34.42 (9.23)
34.38 (8.98)

Biasself = mean updates after desirable information mean updates after undesirable information, in self-trials; Biasother = mean updates after desirable
information mean updates after undesirable information, in other-trials; Biasself_other = biasself biasother. BDI, Beck Depression Inventory; LOT-R, Life Orientation Test; STAI, StateTrait Anxiety Inventory.

Whereas biasself and biasself_other signicantly differed from

zero, t(19) = 5.16, p < .001, r = .46, and t(19) = 3.52, p = .002,
r = .40, respectively, biasother did not, t(19) = 1.56, p = .135,
r = .28.
The correlation analyses between the optimism bias measures and the trait optimism scores did not reveal a signicant
relationship between biasself and LOT-R, rs = .11, p = .327,
or between biasother and LOT-R, rs = .52, p = .018 (note that
p < .017, corrected for multiple testing). Critically,
biasself_other was signicantly related to LOT-R, rs = .49,
p = .014, indicating that the more participants updating was
optimistically biased for self relative to other, the higher they
scored on trait optimism.
Because of the unexpected result relating to the lack of
correlation between biasself and trait optimism, we descriptively explored the data by dividing the overall sample into
two subsamples by the median of the LOT-R scores
(Mdn = 18). All participants scoring lower than 18 were
assigned to the low-trait-optimism subsample (lowTO,
n = 15), and all participants scoring equal or higher than 18
were assigned to the high-trait-optimism subsample
(highTO, n = 5; a more equal division was not possible because eight participants had the score of 18). These two subsamples showed completely different updating patterns
(Figure 3A): Whereas lowTO showed similarly decreased

updates after negative base rates for self and other, highTO
updated less after negative base rates only in self-related
judgments, but not in other-related judgments. Because of
the low and unbalanced sizes of subsamples, we did not compute an analysis of variance (ANOVA) with trait optimism as
a between-subject factor.

Stimulus event characteristics

The size of the base rates was not related to the updates (mean r
for the sample = .09). Furthermore, there were no signicant
differences across the four experimental conditions (self_p,
self_n, other_p, and other_n) with regard to participants
ratings of event characteristics valence, arousal, controllability,
or personal experience (all ps > .05; in order, means across the
four conditions were 2.22, 4.91, 3.36, and 2.88; SDs = 0.38,
0.56, 0.39, and 0.22). Thus, these event characteristics can be
ruled out as possible confounding variables.

Discussion
The primary purpose of Study 1 was to investigate
whether there is a self-specic optimism bias in updating
of beliefs relating to future outcomes. Furthermore, Study

Figure 3. Exploration of the relationship between the update behavior and trait optimism in Study 1 (A) and Study 2 (B). The overall samples
from both studies were divided into a low-trait-optimism subsample and a high-trait-optimism subsample by using the median Life Orientation
Test score (both Mdns = 18) in order to compare the patterns of update behavior. In both studies, the participants with low trait optimism demonstrated a decreased updating after undesirable new information for both self and other, whereas the participants with high trait optimism
showed this bias selectively for self-related judgments. Error bars show SD

Copyright 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

J. Behav. Dec. Making (2014)

DOI: 10.1002/bdm

B. Kuzmanovic et al.
1 explored the relationship between task performance and
trait optimism.

General evidence for self-specic optimism bias in belief

updating
Study 1 clearly demonstrated that learning about hazard
probabilities is optimistically biased because updating was
decreased in response to undesirable information relative to
desirable information. All three learning measures revealed
that, on average, people tend to change their mind to a lower
extent in light of new information when this information suggests a higher risk for adverse events than previously expected. In turn, this neglect of undesirable new information
may explain how it is possible to maintain optimism despite
disproving evidence (Sharot et al., 2011). Critically, under
constant conditions with controlled discrepancies between
participants predictions and the new information, this
asymmetric learning was specic for self-referential judgments. Thus, the present experiment replicates prior ndings
(Alloy & Ahrens, 1987; Sharot et al., 2011) and extends
them by indicating that predictive optimism may be more
inuential in self-related information processing. Nevertheless, participants also tended to show an optimistically biased
learning related to others, and this tendency was related to
their scoring on trait optimism (see next section). Thus, the
self-specicity of the optimism bias can be generalized only
to a limited extent.
The asymmetric, self-defensive learning pattern is easily
recognizable in the mean size of updates. In comparison with
all other conditions, updating was signicantly decreased
only when predicting ones own future outcomes and
confronted with undesirable information, indicating a selfspecic neglect of unfavorable information about the future.
In contrast to updates representing a parametric measure for
the amount of learning, the trials where there was no change
of prediction despite challenging information represent a
categorical resistance to learning. By showing that this
resistance is selectively strong for undesirable self-relevant
information, our results further characterize the previously
demonstrated neglect of population base rates (Dunning &
Story, 1991; Tversky & Kahneman, 1982b). This has been
described as a general neglect in the sense that people give
insufcient weight to the population base rates of relevant
actions or events when making predictions (Dunning &
Story, 1991, p. 523). However, the amount of the total base
rate neglect was signicantly greater selectively for undesirable self-relevant rates, indicating the existence of a more
specic base rate neglect.
The self-serving learning asymmetry was also present in
the third measure relating the updates to estimation errors.
The overall correlation between updates and estimation
errors conrms that updates were generally higher, the more
the new information differed from ones own initial
estimate, in good accordance with formal learning theories
(Garrison et al., 2013). However, the correlation was signicantly lower for self-referential learning from undesirable
information than for all other conditions. This nding shows
that estimation errors were less inuential in those cases in
Copyright 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Optimism Bias and Trait Optimism

which acknowledging them would have led to unfavorable
future outlooks for oneself.
It is important to note that participants did not report any
difculties in making judgments about similar others and that
they did not simply adjust their other-related estimates to the
presented base rates. This is evident in the similar level of
updating for all three measures (except for self-related
updating after negative information), and most directly when
considering the measure relating to the correlation between
updates and estimation errors. Here, the correlations were
not close to 1 for other-related updates.
However, it remains unclear to what extent the participants
indeed perceived the difference between their own initial
estimates and the presented base rate as estimation errors
(see Study 2 for a more detailed discussion). For this reason,
it is critical whether effects of desirability and target person
prove to be reliable under experimental replication with a control for the subjectively assumed base rates, particularly when
using estimation errors to compute the measure of learning.

Relationship between optimism bias in belief updating and

trait optimism
The individual bias calculations provide additional support for optimistically asymmetric self-related belief
updating. Whereas the self-related bias (biasself) and the
self-relative-to-other bias (biasself_other) were signicantly
greater than zero, this was not the case for the otherreferent bias (biasother). Furthermore, correlation analyses
revealed that trait optimism correlated positively with
biasself_other, but not with biasself. That is, participants
scoring higher on trait optimism were less likely to update
their judgments in response to undesirable than to desirable information, and this to a greater extent for judgments concerning themselves than others. Moreover, the
inverse correlation between trait optimism and otherrelated optimism bias indicates that the higher the trait
score, the lower the other-serving bias. Although this
correlation did not survive the correction for multiple
comparisons and thus should be interpreted with caution,
additional support for its relevance can be derived from
the descriptive data separating the overall sample into
low-trait-optimism and high-trait-optimism subsamples.
These two subsamples did not differ with respect to the
self-related bias in updating, but only with respect to the
other-related bias, which explains why there was no
signicant correlation between biasself and LOT-R. Participants with high trait optimism demonstrated a tendency
for a selective, self-specic optimism bias, whereas participants with low trait optimism showed this tendency also
in other-related judgments. This differential nding offers
an alternative interpretation of the data toward a general
optimism bias in belief updating, indicating that this bias
is self-specic only in highly optimistic persons. However,
because of relatively small subsamples and the low variance
in trait optimism, these relationships need to be further
replicated.
Together, these results suggest that the self-serving bias
alone does not seem to be as crucial for capturing the
J. Behav. Dec. Making (2014)
DOI: 10.1002/bdm

Journal of Behavioral Decision Making

general dispositional tendency to have positive future
outlooks as the difference between self-serving and otherserving bias.

STUDY 2: METHODOLOGICAL VALIDATION AND

REPLICATION
The present paradigm, however, also gives rise to methodological concerns with respect to the measured optimism bias
effects. When estimating risks, two sources of information
are important: rst, the base rate of an event and, second,
the personal vulnerability that decreases or increases the individual likelihood of encountering an event, relative to the
average probability. For instance, the personal risk of suffering from depression depends on the respective base rate and
individual factors such as family history or exposure to
stress, and others. When vulnerability evidence is lacking,
the best anchor for an estimate is the base rate. However,
when a high or low personal vulnerability is assumed, the
personal estimate may be higher or lower than the base rate.
For example, when a participant thinks that she or he has an
increased risk for depression because of her or his family
history, she or he may think that the general base rate for
depression is 10%, but estimates her or his own individual
risk to be 40%. A subsequently presented base rate of 20%
would be dened as desirable when considering the
participants estimate (as the 20% base rate is lower than
the 40% rst estimate), but undesirable when considering
the base rate initially assumed by the participant (as the
20% base rate is higher than the 10% base rate assumed by
the participant). In other words, valence classications based
on participants rst estimates on the one hand and on
participants subjective base rates on the other hand are not
consistent in this case. Thus, within the present paradigm,
the exact size of the subjectively perceived estimation error
and the desirability of the new information cannot be
assessed absolutely reliably. In consequence, it is possible
that the valence of the presented base rate relative to participants expectations may be misclassied (in the following,
apparent valence misclassication). To control for this in
Study 2, participants were asked to provide subjectively
assumed base rates for all stimulus events prior to the update
experiment. The aim was to test whether the optimism bias in
belief updating can be replicated even when trials with
apparent valence misclassications are identied and
excluded from analysis.
Furthermore, Study 2 sought to provide additional evidence relating to the relationship between trait optimism
and the optimism bias in belief updating.

Method
Participants
A total of 29 individuals were recruited online at the
University of Cologne, Germany. Three persons were
excluded from the analyses because they had missing
responses in more than one third of the trials per condition. Thus, data from 26 participants were included in
Copyright 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

the analyses (mean age = 24.92 years, SD = 2.77, ranging

from 21 to 31; 12 women). All participants were nave
with respect to the specic purpose of the study, gave
written informed consent, and were paid for their participation. The study was approved by the local ethics committee of the Medical Faculty of the University of
Cologne, Germany.

Stimulus material, design, and procedure

Stimuli, design, and procedure were identical to those of
Study 1. The only difference was that a separate task
assessing subjective estimates of population base rates was
conducted at the beginning of the session, that is, before
the update experiment. Here, participants were asked to estimate the base rate for all stimulus events (see Supporting
Information S2 for the complete instruction text). This task
was carried out on a laptop with the software Presentation
(version 15.1) with a preceding standardized, computerized
instruction including practice trials. Because the characteristics of stimulus events were evaluated in a comprehensive
way in Study 1, in Study 2, we only assessed participants
personal experience with the stimulus events.

Measures
The following measures, which were computed as described
in Study 1, were used: update, update0, update_error, and
bias measures biasself, biasother, and biasself_other (Measures
in Study 1). Additionally, these six measures were computed
after identication and exclusion of trials with apparent
valence misclassications (corrected, corr). Trials with apparent valence misclassication were those where the
valence classication based on the rst estimate and that
based on the subjective base rate estimate differed (see example in the introduction of Study 2). In the latter, we simply
compared the subjective estimates of base rates with the
presented base rates in order to determine whether the presented rates were better or worse than assumed.
Furthermore, we report correlations between the optimism
bias measures and trait optimism scores, as well as an analysis with the between-subject factor trait optimism. For this
analysis, the overall sample was divided by the median of
the LOT-R scores as described in Study 1 (Mdn = 18;
highTO, n = 14; lowTO, n = 12).

Statistical analyses
We tested for the optimism bias before and after correction for
apparent misclassications by using a multivariate rmANOVA
with two within-subject independent variables, target person
and valence, and six dependent variables update, updatecorr,
update0, update0corr, update_error, and update_errorcorr.
Furthermore, we tested for differences between biasself and
biasselfcorr, biasother and biasothercorr, and biasself_other and
biasself_othercorr.
In order to test for relationships between the measures of
the optimism bias and trait optimism, Spearmans correlation
coefcients (rs) were calculated (p < .017, corrected for
J. Behav. Dec. Making (2014)
DOI: 10.1002/bdm

B. Kuzmanovic et al.

Optimism Bias and Trait Optimism

multiple testing). On the basis of the ndings in Study 1, we

expected a positive correlation between biasself and
biasself_other and LOT-R and a negative one between biasother
and LOT-R (one-tailed testing). We further explored the
update behavior by conducting a mixed ANOVA including
the between-subject independent variable trait optimism
(lowTO vs. highTO), within-subject independent variables
target person and valence, and the dependent variable update
(without correction).

Results
Update experiment
Table 3 and Figure 4 show results revealed by the multivariate rmANOVA on six dependent variables: update, update0,
and update_error, with and without correction, respectively.
Taken together, most of the results of Study 1 could be
replicated, independently of correction, with the following

exceptions. First, the main effect of target person on update

was not signicant after correction, but this effect was not of
central interest anyway. Second, the comparison between the
base rate neglect (update0) for other_p and other_n reached
signicance in Study 2, however not after the correction.
Third, and of critical interest, the interaction effect between target person and valence was not signicant for the correlation
between update and estimation error (update_error), independent of correction. For the other two dependent variables,
update and update0, the critical interaction effect was signicant irrespective of correction (see Table 3 for further details).

Biases
There were no signicant differences between bias measures
without and with correction: biasself, t(25) = 1.12, p = .274,
r = .21, M = 2.60, SD = 2.50, Mcorr = 2.26, SDcorr = 3.05; biasother,
t(25) = 1.66, p = .109, r = .25, M = 0.70, SD = 3.31, Mcorr = 0.35,

Table 3. Comparison of corrected and uncorrected effects of target person and valence on three measures of belief updating from
Study 2: update, categorical resistance to update (update0), and correlation between update and estimation error (update_error)
Source

SD

F/t

5.34/7.12
6.71/7.74
7.13/5.50
7.67/6.67

2.24/2.74
2.81/3.01
2.40/2.41
2.60/3.18

9.89**
3.94
12.86**
6.77*
7.63*
4.96*

.004
.058
.001
.015
.011
.035

.53
.37
.58
.46

6.69/4.09
7.55/5.30
7.47/6.77
7.82/7.47

2.92/2.13
3.35/2.92
2.78/3.58
2.91/4.14

5.30**
3.77**
1.08
0.49

.000
.001
.290
.630

.42
.36
.20
.14

42.14/28.78
35.24/25.29
28.28/41.38
24.89/37.16

20.77/18.71
19.89/16.75
17.31/20.76
16.19/20.52

17.91**
10.50**
24.68**
30.06**
5.50*
4.88*

.000
.003
.000
.000
.027
.037

.65
.54
.70
.74

32.85/50.91
27.53/47.89
24.66/32.77
22.81/30.39

21.26/22.47
20.77/22.24
17.93/23.61
16.80/25.12

6.21**
5.84**
2.13*
1.81

.000
.000
.043
.083

.45
.44
.28
.26

0.31/0.54
0.32/0.54
0.54/0.37
0.54/0.34

0.18/0.17
0.21/0.19
0.17/0.12
0.20/0.18

17.93**
17.49**
17.14**
15.69**
1.47
3.97

.000
.000
.000
.001
.237
.057

.65
.64
.64
.62

0.47/0.27
0.49/0.19
0.61/0.52
0.60/0.51

0.26/0.22
0.30/0.32
0.18/0.24
0.21/0.27

3.76**
3.79**
1.54
1.32

.001
.001
.137
.199

.36
.36
.24
.22

Mean update
Target person: self/other
Valence: p/ n
Target person valence
Pairwise comparisons
Self_p/self_n
Other_p/other_n
Update0 (%)
Target person: self/other
Valence: p/n
Target person valence
Pairwise comparisons
Self_p/self_n
Other_p/other_n
Update_error (r)
Target person: self/other
Valence: p/n
Target person valence
Pairwise comparisons
Self_p/self_n
Other_p/other_n

Note. Data with correction for apparent misclassications of valence are in bold, below the original data. All dfs were 25. _p and _n, positive and
negative valence of base rates.
*p < .05,
**p < .01.

Copyright 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

J. Behav. Dec. Making (2014)

DOI: 10.1002/bdm

Journal of Behavioral Decision Making

Figure 4. Results of Study 2 validating the update paradigm. The data without correction represent the original analysis, and the data with correction represent the analysis after exclusion of trials with apparent valence misclassications. The successful replication of the critical ndings irrespective of correction demonstrates that valence misclassications do not systematically inuence the effects indicating an optimism
bias in belief updating. Error bars show 95% condence interval

SDcorr = 3.64; and biasself_other, t(25) = 0.02, p = .987, r = .03,

M = 1.90, SD = 3.51, Mcorr = 1.90, SDcorr = 4.37. Furthermore
both with and without correction, biasself and biasself_other
signicantly differed from zero (without correction:
t(25) = 5.30, p < .001, r = .42, and t(25) = 2.76, p = .011,
r = .32, respectively; with correction: t(25) = 3.78, p = .001,
r = .36, and t(25) = 2.23, p = .035, r = .29, respectively), but
biasother did not (without correction: t(25) = 1.08, p = .290,
r = .20; with correction: t(25) = 0.49, p = .630, r = .14).

Frequencies
On average, 23.04 (SD = 5.38) out of 88 trials in the experiment met the criteria of apparent valence misclassication.
However, only in 1.46 trials (SD = 1.30) out of these was
the update made in a direction that one would not expect
given the rst estimate and the base rate (compared with
the mean of 1.19 trials from the non-misclassied trials).
By expected direction, we mean an increased second
estimate if the base rate was higher than the rst estimate
and a decreased second estimate if the base rate was lower
than the rst estimate.

Relationship between optimism bias and trait optimism

The correlation analyses revealed a signicant relationship
between LOT-R and biasself_other, rs = .49, p = .011, and nonsignicant correlations between LOT-R and biasself, rs = .37,
p = .032, and biasother, rs = .20, p = .161, respectively.
The mixed ANOVA with the between-subject factor trait
optimism, within-subject factors target person and valence,
and the dependent variable update (without correction)
revealed signicant main effects of target person, F(1, 24)
= 9.66, p = .005, r = .54, and valence, F(1, 24) = 12.50,
p = .002, r = .59, and a signicant interaction between target
person and valence, F(1, 24) = 8.39, p = .008, comparable
with the results relating to the overall sample. Although there
was no signicant main effect of trait optimism and this
Copyright 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

factor did not signicantly interact with target person or

valence (all ps > .6), there was a signicant three-way interaction between trait optimism, target person, and
valence, F(1, 24) = 7.98, p = .009. In accordance, there were
different updating patterns for the two subsamples with low
and high trait optimism (Figure 3B): Whereas participants
with low trait optimism showed similarly decreased updates
after negative base rates for self (Mself_p = 6.39, SD = 2.83;
Mself_n = 4.56, SD = 2.33; t(11) = 3.09, p = .010, r = .47) and
other (Mother_p = 8.32, SD = 2.65; Mother_n = 6.53, SD = 3.11;
t(11) = 2.32, p = .036, r = .42), participants with high trait
optimism updated less after negative base rates only in selfrelated judgments (Mself_p = 6.95, SD = 3.08; Mself_n = 3.68,
SD = 1.94; t(13) = 4.47, p = .001, r = .51), but not in otherrelated judgments (Mother_p = 6.75, SD = 2.78; Mother_n = 6.98,
SD = 4.04; t(13) = 0.24, p = .817, r = .13).

First estimates
Mean rst estimates were lower for judgments relating to self
(M = 30.96, SD = 9.89) than other (M = 37.37, SD = 10.52),
t(25) = 3.83, p = .001, r = .61.

Discussion
Study 2 successfully replicated the optimism bias in belief
updating, supporting the validity of the paradigm. Participants
were generally less likely to update their beliefs in response to
undesirable information, and this to a greater extent during
self-related judgments. This optimism bias was indicated by
the estimation-error-independent measures, mean update and
the percentage of the base rate neglect (update0), as well as
by the individual bias measures. Critically, these results were
demonstrated both without any corrections and in the analyses
excluding trials for which the assessment of participants
subjective base rates suggested a misclassication of the
desirability of new information.
J. Behav. Dec. Making (2014)
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B. Kuzmanovic et al.
Taken together, valence misclassication cannot account
for the demonstrated bias effects. On the basis of participants assessments of the general base rate, in approximately
one-quarter of trials, apparent misclassications occurred.
Notably, such misclassications would be expected to lead
to a different direction of updating, resulting in negative
update values (because participants do not adjust their rst
estimates toward the presented base rate). However, this only
occurred extremely rarely, indicating that, during the experiment, subjects focused on the presented base rates instead of
on their own prior base rate estimations. At the same time,
however, this neglect of own prior beliefs about base rates
contradicts the general tendency to hold on subjective beliefs
(Slovic et al., 1982). Therefore, we suggest that the neglect
of own prior belief reects memory effects in the sense that
it was not possible for the participants to remember what they
assumed about each of the 88 base rates. Thus, in future studies, the inuence of subjective base rates should be treated
with greater precision within experimental designs (see our
suggestion in Limitations). Along with the replication of effects irrespective of correction, this interpretation relating to
memory effects suggests that subjective base rates played
only a minor role within the update task and are thus not
likely to systematically inuence the observed effects.
However, for the measure relating to the correlation between
updates and estimation errors, the critical interaction effect
between target person and valence did not reach signicance, irrespective of correction for apparent valence misclassications.
This may be attributable to the increased measurement error
within the assessment of the true, that is, subjective
estimation errors, because the potentially relevant personal
vulnerabilities were unknown for the individual participants
and the different future events. If it is possible for the true
subjectively perceived error to be unequal to the exact difference between the own rst estimate and the presented base
rate, then this measurement error may attenuate the size of
related correlations, so that their use as a dependent variable
may lead to inconsistent and unreliable results.
Alternatively, moderator effects of trait optimism as
reported for the measure update might be responsible for the
non-signicant interaction effect. Indeed, similar to the analysis on updates, an equivalent mixed ANOVA on the measure
update_error revealed strikingly differential response patterns
for the subsamples with low and high trait optimism, which
tend to cancel each other out when collapsed (the results of
the mixed ANOVA are shown in Supporting Information
S4). However, for the measure update, the interaction between
target person and valence was signicant despite the moderator
effect of trait optimism, so that it appears plausible that both
explanationsthe problems in measuring estimation errors
and the moderator effect of trait optimismmay have contributed to the unreliable results of this measure.
With regard to the relationship between trait optimism and
the optimism bias in belief updating, Study 2 replicated the ndings of Study 1 with a bigger and more balanced sample. The
signicant correlation between biasself_other and trait optimism
conrms that the higher participants scored on trait optimism,
the higher their optimism bias in belief updating for self relative
to other. Thus, there seems to be a good reliability of the
Copyright 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Optimism Bias and Trait Optimism

relationship between trait optimism and the self-relative-to-other
optimism bias in belief updating, along with non-signicant
relationships when self-related and other-related optimism
biases are considered independently. Furthermore, the different
update patterns of the subsamples with low and high trait
optimism were replicated as well, which are interpreted in more
detail in the General Discussion and Conclusions.

GENERAL DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS

Optimistically biased updating is present when objective
and statistically relevant information about the future is
treated differently depending on its desirability. This bias explains how it is possible to maintain optimism in the face of
disconrming reality (Sharot et al., 2011). In contrast to
classical research (Shepperd et al., 2013), the measure of
the optimism bias based on belief updating does not
depend on lower probability estimations relative to the
average (or a similar other) person, but solely on the
differential information use within subjects under otherwise
constant circumstances. Importantly, post-experimental
debriengs revealed that participants were not aware of
their self-protective update behavior that tends to dismiss
undesirable new information. Moreover, the optimism bias
measure, which directly contrasts self-related and otherrelated belief update asymmetries, has proven to be reliably
related to individual differences in trait optimism.
In general, people tend to hold subjective beliefs with great
condence and are resistant to acknowledging new evidence
(Slovic et al., 1982). However, our ndings indicate that this
general tendency has to be differentially weighted. When people make judgments about the future, they tend to learn from
desirable, but not from undesirable information. Thus, the
persistence of beliefs seems to be specically strong when it
leads to protective rejections of new information that would
support negative expectations toward the future. The same
differential conclusions have to be made for the general
tendency to neglect population base rates (Dunning & Story,
1991; Tversky & Kahneman, 1982b). The nding that this
tendency was specically strong for undesirable base rates
may suggest that people neglect base rates simply because
they are often worse than initially expected.
The present study also targeted the question of whether
the optimism bias leading to discounting of undesirable
information holds in general, or specically in self-related
prospective judgments. Whereas the consideration of the
overall data suggests a self-specic prospective optimism,
the differential inspection of individuals with varying trait
optimism indicates that the optimism bias becomes selfselective only in persons with high trait optimism. Because
individuals with low trait optimism demonstrated a general
bias in belief updating, that is, for both self and other, they
may have the expectation that there is no substantial difference between themselves and others with respect to the
relevance of risk-related information. This, in turn, may lead
to the impression that there is no reason to expect especially
positive future outcomes for oneself relative to similar others.
In other words, low optimism does not necessarily imply a
J. Behav. Dec. Making (2014)
DOI: 10.1002/bdm

Journal of Behavioral Decision Making

negative future outlook, but simply a similar future outlook
for self and others. In contrast, individuals with relatively
high trait optimism did not seem to discount undesirable
information in an optimistically biased manner when judging
about others. Here, the optimism bias in belief updating was
selective for self-relevant judgments, therefore enabling
participants to ultimately assume a decreased likelihood of
experiencing negative future events relative to others, which
is well established in the classical optimism bias research
(Shepperd et al., 2013). In this sense, optimistically biased
judgments may represent the defensive mechanism responsible for the adaptive function of trait optimism related to
increased motivation to take action to achieve desired goals
and to the protection against feelings of helplessness and
depression (Alloy & Ahrens, 1987; Carver et al., 2010).
It would be interesting to extend the investigation of
biased belief updating along these lines by including
samples with a wider range of trait optimism, through to
individuals suffering from depression. Although it could
already be shown that depressive persons do not show a
self-related optimism bias in belief updating (Korn et al.,
2014), it remains uncertain how they behave when they
judge about others. One possibility could be that they do
not demonstrate a neglect of undesirable information either
for self or others. Alternatively, they may not show a selfrelated, but only an other-related, optimism bias. These
considerations further emphasize the importance of a
simultaneous assessment of self-related and other-related
belief updating (Pyszczynski et al., 1987).
The present paradigm also entails information about
general estimates of risks, independent of their subsequent
updating, that were used for assessing unrealistic comparative optimism in the classical optimism research
(Shepperd et al., 2013). In both Studies 1 and 2, when
participants were asked to estimate probabilities of adverse future events in their own future or in the future
of similar others (and before they were confronted with
the respective base rates), they tended to expect lower
risks for themselves than for others, which replicates the
unrealistic comparative optimism (Shepperd et al., 2013).
However, in the present study, participants did not give
estimates for both self and other with respect to the
same life events as in previous research, as one-half
of event stimuli were assigned to the self-condition
and the other to the other-condition. Importantly, because
this assignment was performed randomly and anew for
each participant, it can be ruled out that this effect may
relate to differences in event types in estimates for self
and other.
The understanding of genuine human biases and the
related judgmental limitations is an essential prerequisite
for improving effective decision making and dissemination
of information (Slovic et al., 1982). For instance, it has
previously been suggested that health prevention programs
have to make sure that risk factor information is not only
known but also applied to oneself (Weinstein, 1987).
However, the present results suggest that exactly this process
might be even more difcult than expected, as people seem
to be very effective in refusing to integrate new information
Copyright 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

related to their own and similar others risks when it would

lead to unfavorable future outlooks.

LIMITATIONS
Although the optimism bias has been demonstrated for both
positive and negative events, in the present study, we
included only negative events. The reason for this procedure
is that the optimism bias tends to be greater for negative
events (Gold & de Sousa, 2011). Furthermore, there is much
more consensus about what constitutes a negative event in
the sense that most people would want to avoid the experience of a disease or an accident, while people may differ to
a larger extent in their evaluations of positive events
(Weinstein, 1980). In addition, it is difcult to nd positive
events that show similar frequencies over the lifetime as the
negative ones (e.g., eat at your favorite restaurant is likely
to occur with a likelihood of 100%). And nally, participants
may be well aware that no ofcial statistics exist for many
base rates of the positive events.
Second, because we wanted to keep the relevance of the
base rate information similar for self and other, we decided
to use base rate statistics relating to the general population.
Although base rates relating to similar others would have
been more informative for self-referential judgments and
thus might have achieved a greater impact, they would have
rendered estimations of risks for similar others trivial
(Harris & Hahn, 2011). Hence, the use of population base
rates can be justied, because it enables an adequate
comparison between self and a similar other.
Third, the use of the linear mixed-effects modeling may
allow for a more appropriate adjustment for and incorporation of correlated data because of repeated measurements
and multiple related outcome measures in future research
(McCulloch & Searle, 2000).
Finally, within the trials with apparent misclassication of
valence in Study 2, we could not reveal a pronounced
inuence of subjectively assumed base rates on the update
behavior (Discussion of Study 2). Rather, participants
adjusted their estimates mostly toward the presented base
rates, possibly because of difculties in remembering their
own base rate estimates. This memory effect could be
avoided by including the assessment of subjective base rates
into the trial of the update experiment. An additional advantage of this design would be the precise assessment of
subjective estimation errors. Moreover, the difference
between the subjective base rate and the rst estimate in such
a design would allow for inferences about participants
estimates of their personal vulnerabilities.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We thank Gloria Ache for data acquisition in Study 2 and
Jan-Hendrik Heinrichs, Holger Schtz, the anonymous
reviewers, and Tali Sharot for their comments on previous
versions of the manuscript.
J. Behav. Dec. Making (2014)
DOI: 10.1002/bdm

B. Kuzmanovic et al.

Optimism Bias and Trait Optimism

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Authors biographies:
Bojana Kuzmanovic is a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of
Neuroscience and Medicine Ethics in the Neurosciences at the
Research Center Juelich. Her research focuses on social cognition
and decision making using behavioral, clinical and neuroscientic
approaches in an interdisciplinary setting.
Anneli Jefferson is a visiting research fellow at the Philosophy
Department at Kings College London and was previously a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine
Ethics in the Neurosciences at the Research Center Juelich.
Her research focus is on philosophy of psychology and ethics,
especially on topics at the intersection of these elds.
Kai Vogeley is a professor for Psychiatry at the University Hospital
Cologne and head of the research group Social Cognition at the
Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine Cognitive Neuroscience
at the Research Center Juelich. His research interests comprise
social cognition and social neuroscience with a recent focus on
nonverbal communication. His clinical interest focuses on highfunctioning autism in adulthood.

Authors addresses:
Bojana Kuzmanovic, Ethics in the Neurosciences (INM-8), Institute
of Neuroscience and Medicine, Research Center Juelich, Jlich,
Germany.
Anneli Jefferson, Department of Philosophy, Kings College London,
London, UK.
Kai Vogeley, Cognitive Neuroscience (INM-3), Institute of Neuroscience
and Medicine, Research Center Juelich, Jlich, Germany.

J. Behav. Dec. Making (2014)

DOI: 10.1002/bdm