Anxiety and fury can be used to achieve greater achievement than enjoyment and relaxation, but at the expense of your health.
The University of Essex is the lead institution in the international study that has revealed how the mind interprets “achievement emotions.” The 12 emotions that support and have an impact on achievement were found scientifically in the paper, which was published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
Although they were thought to be bad emotions, worry and wrath were shown to be energising, much like pleasure and hope.
However, these darker feelings are linked with a lack of strategic thinking and poor health, including stress-related psychosomatic symptoms such as headaches, nausea, back pain, and lack of sleep. Overall hope is the most powerful emotion – with the study discovering positive perceptions and feelings of control lead to enjoyment of learning, desire for success, and pride in accomplishment.
It discovered that if two students of equal ability took a test the hopeful student would achieve one grade higher than their negative-minded peer.
This can mean the less optimistic person would get a failing D whereas the positive student will take home a C. Study leader Professor Reinhard Pekrun, from Essex’s Department of Psychology, said: “This is the first study that has developed a 3D model for success emotions.
“Although the model might seem abstract at first sight, it shows how achievement emotions relate to critically important parts of our lives and can define how we perform in job interviews, tests and other stressful situations. “Interestingly we found feelings like anxiety and anger can sometimes motivate us more than enjoyment or relaxation.
“However, despite its energising powers, the knife edge of anxiety can lead to mental health issues, undermine the functioning of the immune system, and lead to a drop in performance in the long run.
“Overall hope was the healthiest and best way to spark success and promote long-term happiness.Failure and struggle as such don’t define one’s future, it is the perception of failures that has a strong effect on emotional responses.”
