Positive Illusions: Positively Correlated with Subjective Well-Being, Negatively Correlated with a Measure of Personal Growth

Abstract

Psychologists have long debated the benefits and costs of self-deceptive enhancement or positive illusions. Accurate perception of reality is central to the definitions of mental health proposed by many personality and clinical psychologists, but Taylor and Brown have suggested that having positive illusions is associated with increased happiness and satisfaction with life. One explanation for the conflicting assertions is that mental health, broadly defined, includes both subjective well-being and personal growth, distinguishable factors which are differentially related to positive illusions. For this study, 81 college students completed measures of positive illusions (Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding Self-deceptive Positivity and How I See Myself Questionnaire), subjective well-being (Satisfaction With Life Scale and Existential Anxiety Scale), and moral reasoning (Defining Issues Test) as an index of personal growth. As predicted, positive illusion composite scores were positively correlated with scores on the subjective well-being composite ( r = .40) but negatively correlated with Defining Issues Test scores ( r = −.25). The quadratic relationship between these measures of positive illusion and subjective well-being composites was not significant, indicating no support for an “optimal margin of illusion.”