The phenomenon of self-positivity bias refers to the common tendency for individuals to perceive themselves in a more positive light than is objectively warranted. The current study seeks to investigate the impact of enhanced self-positivity bias on depressive mood resulting from negative life events. The study included two experiments, a resistance experiment (exp. 1) and an improvement experiment (exp. 2), with 40 randomly selected college students randomly assigned to either a self-positive bias training group or a neutral training group in each experiment. In the resistance experiment, self-positive bias training was conducted before failure feedback, while in the improvement experiment, it was conducted after failure feedback. The results showed that failure feedback significantly increased depression levels among college students, and self-positive bias training improved the level of self-positive bias. In the resistance experiment, there was no significant difference between the self-positive bias training group and the neutral training group regarding depression. However, in the improvement experiment, being in the self-positive bias training group had a significantly greater effect on improving depression compared to the neutral training group. Overall, the findings suggest that while self-positive bias training cannot prevent depression caused by failure events, it has a positive effect on improving depression.
Keywords: depressive mood; negative life events; self-positivity bias; self-reference task.