Kids Understand the Benefits of Positive Thinking - So Do It!

Just saw this article from child psychology gurus.  I knew it all along but it is good to see the science finally catching up. :)  Here's a snippet:

Children as young as five predicted that people would feel better after thinking positive thoughts (than they would after thinking negative thoughts).

Moreover, the children showed the strongest insight about the influence of positive versus negative thoughts on emotions in ambiguous situations. And there was significant development in the children’s understanding about the emotion-feeling link as they grew older.

The study also found that children (like adults) have difficulty understanding how positive thinking could boost someone’s spirits in situations that involved negative events—such as falling down and getting hurt.

In these coping situations, children’s levels of hope and optimism played a role in their ability to understand the power of positive thinking, but parents’ views on the topic played an even larger part.

“The strongest predictor of children’s knowledge about the benefits of positive thinking—besides age—was not the child’s own level of hope and optimism, but their parents’,” said study leader Christi Bamford, Ph.D.

Link: Kids Understand Benefits of Positive Thinking