The world is not so bad: reading notes <will be fine>

We all know that 'bad' has a bigger impact than 'good', losing a sum of money will give us a bigger psychological impact than winning the same amount of money, and a bad review on a review site may receive more attention than countless previous positive reviews , when reading the news every day, various misfortunes and disasters always occupy more reports and clicks. Humans have retained genes that focus on negativity in the process of evolution, because our ancestors needed to be vigilant and compete for resources at all times, so as to be able to live in Survive in bad and bad situations. There is nothing wrong with being aware of the 'bad' at all times, because we need to be aware of adverse situations and constantly make adjustments and progress. However, over-focusing on and even magnifying the negative effects in our lives not only affects our A healthy mind also allows us to make irrational judgments and even be exploited by those who deliberately incite negative effects.

This week, I finished reading Roy F. Baumeister's new book "It's OK", its subtitle is "pessimists are often right, optimists are often successful". Through a series of studies and experiments, the author first gives a The number "4 : 1" means that in order to offset the impact of one bad thing in a certain area, four good things are needed. If the bad things involve money, then although more money needs to be won to offset our pain of loss, because There are specific values, so it is easier to measure and deal with rationally. But if the bad things involve non-money, especially interpersonal relationships, the negative effects can easily be magnified infinitely. Think about it, when you have conflicts with your partner, family, and friends Do you often need a lot of behaviors to make up for a small offense, and when the relationship is at a low ebb, is it easy for you to list a series of shortcomings and past mistakes of the other party, but instead think about the advantages and benefits of the other party Not getting up. The most important advice the author gives in the book against the negative effects of relationships is: Avoiding bad things is more important than good things, typical examples include not overcommitting, not expecting credit for extra effort, Don't easily attribute the other person's fault to the other person's personal qualities and so on. A relationship is often not what you do for the other person, but what you don't do.

Another example the author cites where the "good" outweighs the "bad" is the way to improve customer ratings on websites. In the age of the Internet and social media, we are all accustomed to looking at various review sites. The evaluation of various products and services determines our consumption trends. Of course, merchants are also well versed in this, so there have been a lot of behaviors of hiring "water army" on the Internet to give praise to themselves or to give negative points to opponents. How to judge the authenticity of these reviews? According to research on Amazon Book Reviews and other online clothing retailers in the United States, fake reviews, both positive and negative, tend to be longer than average, but they provide specific information about a product or service. There are less details, more general opinions or irrelevant information, and more exclamation points are easy to use. Then for those negative reviews that do exist, especially some customers who are happy with negative reviews, businesses should What should we do? Don't forget, because of the existence of negative effects, we will always pay more attention to the negative reviews and complaints on the website. At this time, merchants need to use more space and details to highlight the positive reactions. For example, in the book The Casablanca Hotel cited for the "moon girl" who is always picking on the wrong side of the negative score, the hotel did not state the customer's strange behavior and counterattack accordingly, but showed a reconciliation gesture, guiding the reader to see the real room photos, giving Reply that is much longer than a negative review, and end up with reassuring advice for future guests. This way, readers browsing the web will naturally make their own judgments as to whether the negative review is justified.

The author gives a concept "crisis of crisis" at the end of the book. Yes, we are indeed facing various problems in contemporary society, but perhaps the biggest problem and obstacle comes from the use of negative bias by those "crisis mongers" . "Bad" drives news coverage, shapes public discourse, and is used by journalists, politicians, malicious actors on social media, and trolls in an attempt to reverse the public's perception of the present and the future. They hype up little or no Threats to exist to trigger panic reactions that create far more problems than they need to be addressed, a "crisis of crisis". For example, child mortality in developing countries has halved over the past 20 years , the global poverty rate has fallen by two-thirds, even in the United States, where shootings are reported every day, the overall crime rate is actually declining, yet North Americans and Europeans are being asked whether the world is getting better or worse , the vast majority of people think the situation is getting worse. Another example, we all agree that people's political views have become more and more polarized under the influence of social media, but in fact, if you look at the polls carefully, whether freedom The majority of people are still moderates, but at the same time they will think that the views of the other side are extreme and worry about it. (So maybe there are not so many real pinks in China?) We really should Be wary of alarmists who sow discord between different groups and emphasize the dangers of each other. Author Willam Tucker has said that two methods of incitement have always worked well, one is telling the poor that the rich are too rich, and the other is Tell the rich and the poor too much. Does this context look familiar today?

In fact, human beings have the ability and willingness to adjust their mentality to pay more attention to positive things and make themselves more positive and happy. On social media, we may be temporarily attracted by some negative things, but what we are most willing to share is Positive things that make people feel happy. Older adults seem to do better on "social-emotional choices," perhaps because they feel they don't have much time left in their lives, and are therefore more willing to focus on positive things, the study found. things, and are more willing to switch perspectives and look at problems from a relatively positive perspective. Each of us can train ourselves to reduce the impact of negative effects, such as: sharing good news with others, trying to be happy when hearing good news from others, always Think about the blessings you have encountered, especially the things you are grateful for, and cherish the past but don't compare it to the present. Remember, most crises in the world are not as dire as they sound, "thinking in the crowd, and going from Everyone is crazy, only by thinking independently, can we slowly recover one by one."