... the positive-to-negative ratio you’ll arrive at is somewhere between three to one and five to one—three to five moments of appreciative attention for every one piece of negative feedback. While there is no need to obsess over the mathematical precision of the ratios, the science suggests that if you aim for this level of deliberate imbalance you and your team will be well served.

Before: Interrogative Self-Talk …

Tell yourself you can do it. Declaring an unshakable belief in your inherent awesomeness inflates a sturdy raft that can keep you bobbing in an ocean of rejection.

Alas, the social science shows something different and more nuanced…

Yes, positive self-talk is generally more effective than negative self-talk. But the most effective self-talk of all doesn’t merely shift emotions. It shifts linguistic categories. It moves from making statements to asking questions…

On average, the self-questioning group solved nearly 50 percent more puzzles than the self-affirming group…

The reasons are twofold. First, the interrogative, by its very form, elicits answers—and within those answers are strategies for actually carrying out the task…

The second reason is related. Interrogative self-talk, the researchers say, “may inspire thoughts about autonomous or intrinsically motivated reasons to pursue a goal.”...

During: Positivity Ratios …

Barbara Fredrickson of the University of North Carolina is the leading researcher on positivity—her catchall term for a basket of emotions including amusement, appreciation, joy, interest, gratitude, and inspiration. Negative emotions, she says, evolved to narrow people’s vision and propel their behavior toward survival in the moment (I’m frightened, so I’ll flee. I’m angry, so I’ll fight). By contrast, “Positive emotions do the opposite: They broaden people’s ideas about possible actions, opening our awareness to a wider range of thoughts and . . . making us more receptive and more creative,” she writes.

The broadening effect of positive emotions has important consequences for moving others. Consider both sides of a typical transaction. For the seller, positive emotions can widen her view of her counterpart and his situation. Where negative emotions help us see trees, positive ones reveal forests. And that, in turn, can aid in devising unexpected solutions to the buyer’s problem. Other studies show that positive emotions can expand our behavioral repertoires and heighten intuition and creativity, all of which enhance our effectiveness…

Fredrickson and Losada round up to 3. Once positive emotions outnumbered negative emotions by 3 to 1—that is, for every three instances of feeling gratitude, interest, or contentment, they experienced only one instance of anger, guilt, or embarrassment—people generally flourished. Those below that ratio usually did not. But Fredrickson and Losada also found that positivity had an upper limit. Too much can be as unproductive as too little. Once the ratio hit about 11 to 1, positive emotions began doing more harm than good. Beyond that balance of positive-to-negative, life becomes a festival of Panglossian cluelessness, where self-delusion suffocates self-improvement. Some negativity—what Fredrickson and Losada call “appropriate negativity”—is essential. Without it, “behavior patterns calcify.” Negative emotions offer us feedback on our performance, information on what’s working and what’s not, and hints about how to do better.

Buoyancy, whether positivity ratios or explanatory style, isn’t about banishing the negative. Negativity and negative emotions are crucial for our survival. They prevent unproductive behaviors from cementing into habits. They deliver useful information on our efforts. They alert us to when we’re on the wrong path.

Without negativity you . . . lose touch with reality. You’re not genuine. In time, you drive people away.” So allow yourself what she dubs “appropriate negativity

For more information, visit Seligman’s website (http://www.authentichappiness.sas.upenn.edu/Default.aspx), and take his Optimism Test to get a sense of your current style. And check out his classic book, Learned Optimism: How to Change Your Mind and Your Life.