A person's optimism about the future seems to be controlled by
the rostral anterior cingulate cortex (rACC). For those of you
pessimistic about pronouncing the words, that's a small front part
of the mid-brain.
That area deep behind the eyes activates when people think good
thoughts about what might happen in the future. The more optimistic
a person is, the brighter the area showed up in brain scans, the
scientists reported in a small study published online Thursday in
the journal Nature.
That same part of the brain seems to malfunction in people
suffering depression, said the study co-authors, Elizabeth Phelps
of New York University and Tali Sharot of University College
London.
Researchers gave 15 people functional magnetic resonance imaging
scans while they thought about future possibilities. When the
participants thought about good events both the rACC and amygdala,
which is involved in emotional responses including fear, were
activated. But the correlation with optimism was biggest with the
cingulate cortex.
The same study also found that people tended to think that
happier events were closer in time and more vivid than the bad
ones, even if they had no reason to believe it, Phelps said.
When researchers asked the subjects to think about 80 different
future events that could be good, bad or neutral, they had a hard
time getting people to think negatively, or even neutrally, about
the future. For example, when people were asked to ponder a future
haircut, they imagined getting the best haircut of their lives,
instead of just an ordinary trim, Phelps said.
The study makes sense and pulls together new and different parts
of research on optimism and the brain, said Dan Schacter, a
professor of psychology at Harvard University who wasn't part of
the research.
Having our brains wired to optimism is generally a good thing
because "if you were pessimistic about the future you would not be
motivated to take a lot of action," Phelps said.
(Agencies via Xinhua October 26, 2007)