Positive thoughts can have negative impact on those who have low self-esteem

We’re often told that we’ ll feel better if we think positive thoughts, and that our self-esteem will rise if we simply repeat positive statements such as “I’m a wonderful person”. But does this really work?

The answer is complicated. It depends not only on your current mood state, but also on the exact words you use. The bad news is that for those who most need to feel happier — those who are socially phobic and/or depressed, and those who ruminate on negative information — this technique can easily backfire.

People who suffer from ruminations — that is, those who are plagued by persistent, unwanted, distressing thoughts or images — find that their own negative thoughts overshadow any positive information about themselves. For example, the thought that they may have inadvertently injured someone or that they’ve been contaminated in some way will seem far more plausible than a positive statement someone else has created. Similarly, social phobics — those who avoid social encounters because they fear the people they meet will reject or criticise them — tend to cling to their negative beliefs, even after admitting their fears are out of proportion to the actual threat posed.

Maree Abbott and Ronald Rapee at the University of Sydney demonstrated this neatly when they informed two groups of participants, one composed of socially phobic individuals and the other of non-anxious people, that they had to give an impromptu speech and that, furthermore, their performance would be evaluated. Participants were then asked to judge how well they thought they did right after they delivered their speech, and again one week later.

During the intervening week, they were also asked to record their thoughts. Abbott and Rapee found that those who suffered from social phobia not only recorded more negative thoughts, but they also worried more about the appraisal, expecting criticism. The non-anxious participants, on the other hand, felt increasingly positive about their performance during the week that followed.

Whether or not we’re self-confident, the content of our self-talk also matters. Joanne Wood and her colleagues at the University of Waterloo presented the statement, “I am a lovable person”, to two groups of participants, those with high self-esteem and those whose self-esteem was low. They asked some participants to repeat the statement to themselves, and some to consider why that statement might be true for them. The result? Those with low self-esteem actually felt worse in both conditions, while those whose self-esteem was already high felt even better, although not significantly so.

These studies tell us that if you hope to benefit from positive selftalk, you should create the mantra yourself, rather than relying on someone else’s. You need to come up with something you consider to be a realistic reflection of your assets.

Furthermore, if you suffer from low self-esteem or low mood, you may wish to consider a course of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy first, so that when the time comes to evaluate your strengths and weaknesses, you’ll be more objective and rational.

Proportion of British people who meet the criteria for diagnosis of mixed anxiety and depression, according to most recent 2009 study

Linda Blair is a clinical psychologist, author of The Key To Calm. Watch her give advice on Telegraph Video.