Hope (psychology)

Hope is a concept that many people have struggled to understand and apply to everyday life since the evolution of humanity. Psychologists define hope as a dynamic cognitive motivational system, or a changing state of positive motivation built on the will and route to achieve one’s specific goal. Through hope, an individual can set goals, determine ways to work toward achieving those goals, and maintain the motivation to pursue the goals—goals that can be applied to any aspect of life, including sports, work, academics, relationships, or personal ambitions. To have hope means that an individual has a desire for something and believes in at least the probability of that desire being fulfilled.

The Greek myth of Pandora, the first woman created by Zeus and sent to Earth with a jar (later mistranslated as a box) that she was warned never to open, is one of the earliest references to hope. Pandora, fulfilling the destiny that Zeus had preordained for her, opened the box and immediately released all the world's evils, unleashing illness, hatred, envy, and spite onto the world. Pandora rushed to shut the lid, but only managed to contain one thing: hope.

The essential and fundamental definition of hope has changed very little over time. Hope is featured in a multitude of myths and religions. Psychologists have even studied the idea of hope, attempting to understand its role in human behavior. There have been several methods of quantifying hope developed since Ezra Stotland provided an initial means of measurement in 1969. Stotland argued that an individual's perception of goal attainment influenced the presence of hope.

The field of positive psychology emerged in 1998, focusing on all the positive aspects of humankind (like hope), while also acknowledging the struggles of all individuals.

Hope and Psychology

Psychologists organize emotions as falling into several categories, but the foundations of human emotion are thought to be centered on fear, sadness, anger, joy, and surprise. Secondary and tertiary categories exist, but these five are the core building blocks in the study and comprehension of how humans feel things. Other less elemental emotions include zest, contentment, pride, relief, optimism, and hope. For example, the primary emotion of joy has secondary components of optimism, cheerfulness, and enthrallment. The tertiary emotions of joy include hope, which is an offshoot of optimism.

Theories that emerged between 1950 and 1960 described hope as an individual's positive expectancies with regard to achieving attainable goals. Although hope is a recognized aspect of the human psyche, it was not widely studied by psychologists until the 1960s. In 1960, Orval Hobart Mowrer conducted several animal-based experiments concerning goal attainment. He deduced that fear is the antithesis of hope. Four years later, Erik Erikson defined hope as "the enduring belief in the attainability of fervent wishes." By 1986, Shlomo Breznitz theorized that hope held a power over life's obstacles and that there was an important relationship between hope and life stressors. He argued that hope gave individuals the ability to overlook such stressors and that despair and hope are intricately linked. He viewed both as "self-fulfilling prophecies," and stated that because the brain will not allow a body to expend energy without a belief in success, hope is what enables a person in a seemingly hopeless situation to endure, while despair will most assuredly lead to failure.

Measuring Hope

Ezra Stotland created the earliest developed method of measuring hope in individuals in 1969. This model studied the role of expectations and theorized that hope was only present when goals are viewed as attainable. Erikson's Hope Scale, a questionnaire with twenty questions about general and common goals, relied upon Stotland's research for its basis. This Hope Scale is rarely used in the twenty-first century, however, because it lacks supporting research. In the late 1970s and 1980s, L.A. Gottschalk developed a Hope Scale to measure hope based on five-minute spoken word segments. The content of these segments demonstrated that people who have hope enjoy more positive expectations about possible outcomes in the face of adversity and are able to handle psychological problems more effectively.

Other scales have been published, but many lack validity and reliability, resulting in their limited usage. These include the Miller Hope Scale (1988), the Expected Balance Scale, and the Hope Index (both 1989). In the twenty-first century, C.R. Snyder's Hope Theory is the most recognized method in use and utilizes the Adult Hope Scale (AHS). Snyder (1991) argued that hope is a "cognitive set involving the belief in one's capabilities to produce workable routes to goals, as well as the self-related beliefs about initiating and sustaining movement toward those goals."

C.R. Snyder also published his belief that hope is a learned behavior rather than a hereditary trait, with hopeful thoughts becoming established by the age of two or three. Children learn behavior and the skills to navigate obstacles from adults, including how to be hopeful. Those with high levels of hope have the capacity to develop multiple ideas on how to overcome obstacles and reach their goals, while those with lower levels will have neither the ability to think of a solution nor the willpower to stay motivated until the goal is attained.

In the twenty-first century, the Hope Scale, the State Hope Scale, the Herth Hope Scale, the Revised Snyder Adult Hope Scale, and the Children's Hope Scale are used by psychologists to measure hope within an individual, determining respective levels of agency thinking and pathways thinking in an individual. Among these, the Adult Hope Scale and State Hope Scale remain among the most widely used instruments in psychological research. Many psychologists believe that having hope leads an individual to form learning goals, which are those that inspire growth and improvement. Those without hope choose to form mastery goals, which are easier tasks that offer little to no challenge or opportunity for self-growth. Other studies include the evaluation of situational hope versus dispositional hope. The Perceived Hope Scale (PHS) was developed in 2017 by Krafft et al. It is based on the concept that “hope is a belief in the possible fulfillment of what is important to an individual.” It has been adapted to many languages such as Arabic, Polish, German, and Italian.

Bibliography

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