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DOI: 10.1111/1467-8721.00073 2000 9: 115Current Directions in
Psychological Science
Susan Folkman and Judith Tedlie MoskowitzStress, Positive
Emotion, and Coping
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AbstractThere is growing interest in
positive aspects of the stressprocess, including
positiveoutcomes of stress and ante-cedents that dispose
individu-als to appraise stressful situa-tions more as a challenge
thanas a threat. Less attention hasbeen given to the
adaptationalsignificance of positive emo-tions during stress or to
thecoping processes that sustainpositive emotions. We
reviewevidence for the occurrence ofpositive emotions under
con-ditions of stress, discuss thefunctional role that
positiveemotions play under such con-ditions, and present three
typesof coping that are associatedwith positive emotion
duringchronic stress. These findingspoint to new research
ques-tions about the role of positiveemotions during stress and
thenature of the coping processesthat generate these
positiveemotions.
Keywordscoping; positive emotion; chron-ic stress
Decades of research have shownthat stress is associated with a
widearray of negative outcomes, such asdepression, anxiety,
physical symp-toms, disease, and even death inextreme cases. In
recent years,however, there has been a growinginterest in positive
aspects of thestress process, including positiveoutcomes such as
personal trans-formation or growth (for review,
see Tedeschi, Park, & Calhoun,1998) and antecedents that
disposeindividuals to appraise situationsmore as a challenge than
as athreat. With the exception of a fewinvestigators such as
Affleck andTennen (1996), however, research-ers have not given much
attentionto the actual coping mechanismsthat link the positive
dispositions,on the one hand, and the positiveoutcomes of stressful
situations, onthe other.
The growing interest in positiveaspects of the stress process is
par-alleled by a growing interest inpositive emotions and, of
particu-lar relevance here, the possibilitythat they may have
important ad-aptational significance during thestress process.
Fredrickson (1998),for example, cited evidence thatpositive
emotions broaden thescope of attention, cognition, andaction, and
help build physical, in-tellectual, and social resources.
HerBroaden and Build Model of Posi-tive Emotions, which is
premisedon this evidence, raises the possi-bility that positive
emotions areimportant facilitators of adaptivecoping and adjustment
to acuteand chronic stress and may under-lie the beneficial effects
of inter-ventions such as relaxation thera-pies (Fredrickson,
2000). Twentyyears ago, we (Lazarus, Kanner, &Folkman, 1980)
suggested thatpositive emotions may have threeimportant adaptive
functions dur-ing stress: sustaining coping ef-forts, providing a
breather, andrestoring depleted resources. How-ever, until
recently, there has beenlittle effort to provide empiricalsupport
for these ideas.
The idea that people even expe-rience positive emotions in
themidst of acute or chronic stressmay at first seem
counterintuitive.But people do experience theseemotions, even under
the most dif-ficult of circumstances. For ex-ample, when we
monitored gaymen who were the primary infor-mal caregivers of
partners withAIDS for up to 5 years, the caregiv-ers reported
levels of depressedmood that were more than onestandard deviation
above levels inthe general population, and in-creased to more than
two standarddeviations above the general popu-lations levels during
periods of cri-sis. Throughout the study, with theexception of the
weeks immedi-ately preceding and following theirpartners deaths,
however, the care-givers also reported experiencingpositive mood at
a frequency com-parable to the frequency of theirnegative mood
(Folkman, 1997).
COPING AND POSITIVEEMOTION
Given data demonstrating thatpositive emotions occur even un-der
the most dire of circumstances,the compelling question becomesnot
whether people experiencepositive emotions during long pe-riods of
severe stress, but rather,how they do it. In our study of
care-givers, we identified three classesof coping mechanisms that
help an-swer this question: positive reap-praisal, problem-focused
coping,and the creation of positive events(Folkman, 1997; Folkman
& Mosk-owitz, in press).
Positive Reappraisal
Positive reappraisal is a cogni-tive process through which
peoplefocus on the good in what is hap-pening or what has
happened.
Stress, Positive Emotion, and CopingSusan Folkman1 and Judith
Tedlie MoskowitzCenter for AIDS Prevention Studies, University of
California-San Francisco,San Francisco, California
115CURRENT DIRECTIONS IN PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE
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Forms of positive reappraisal in-clude discovering opportunities
forpersonal growth, perceiving actualpersonal growth, and seeing
howones own efforts can benefit otherpeople. Through the process
ofpositive reappraisal, the meaningof a situation is changed in a
waythat allows the person to experi-ence positive emotion and
psycho-logical well-being. In our study ofAIDS-related caregiving,
we foundthat positive reappraisal was con-sistently associated with
positiveemotion both during caregivingand after the death of the
partner.This association remained signifi-cant even when emotion at
the pre-vious interview and the other typesof coping were
statistically con-trolled (Moskowitz, Folkman, Col-lette, &
Vittinghoff, 1996).
Not all forms of positive reap-praisal necessarily generate
posi-tive emotion. For example, a cogni-tive reappraisal through
which anindividual devalues an importantgoal that has proven to be
unreal-istic, such as gaining admission to aprestigious Ivy League
school, maybe positive in that it lessens thepersonal significance
of failing toachieve the goal, but it may domore to reduce distress
than to en-hance positive emotion.
Problem-Focused Coping
Problem-focused coping in-cludes thoughts and
instrumentalbehaviors that manage or solve theunderlying cause of
distress. Ittends to be used more in situationsin which there is
personal controlover an outcome and less in situa-tions in which
there is an absenceof personal control. Problem-focused coping is
usually consid-ered maladaptive when there is nopersonal control
(Lazarus & Folk-man, 1984), but this general for-mula may be
overly simplified; asituation that appears on its surfaceto be
uncontrollable may still havecontrollable aspects.
In our research, for example, wefound a significant increase
inproblem-focused coping by care-givers during the weeks leading
upto the partners death, a period ofprofound lack of control. A
reviewof narrative data showed that dur-ing this period caregivers
wereoften creating the proverbial to-dolist, usually comprising
seeminglymundane tasks such as getting aprescription filled,
successfully ad-ministering a medication, or chang-ing the partners
bed linens. Suchlists served multiple purposes: Inattending to even
the most trivialtask, the caregiver had an opportu-nity to feel
effective and in control,thereby helping to combat the feel-ings of
helplessness and lack ofcontrol that often characterized theoverall
situation; working on taskshelped the caregiver feel mobilizedand
focused, which was energiz-ing; and the successful accomplish-ment
of the various tasks was oftenhelpful, in which case the
caregiveroften benefited from positive feed-back from his partner
or otherpeople involved in the partnerscare. An important finding
wasthat this type of coping was re-sponsible for increases in
positivemood (as distinct from decreasesin distress) during these
weeks(Moskowitz et al., 1996).
Creation of Positive Events
This coping mechanism involvescreating a positive
psychologicaltime-out by infusing ordinaryevents with positive
meaning (Folk-man, Moskowitz, Ozer, & Park,1997), as when a
person reflects ona compliment that was offered inpassing, or
pauses to take note of abeautiful sunset. Such time-outsprovide
momentary respite fromthe ongoing stress. In our study
ofcaregivers, we were struck by thepervasiveness of this method
ofcoping throughout caregiving andbereavement. Month after
month,
for example, more than 99% of thecaregivers noted and
rememberedpositive events in the midst ofsome of the most
psychologicallystressful circumstances people en-counter. For the
most part, theseevents were ordinary events ofdaily life that in
less stressful mo-ments might not even have beennoted. We believe
the occurrence ofthese positive events was not ran-dom. Rather,
caregivers createdthem deliberately by planningpositive events,
noting positiveevents when they occurred seren-dipitously, or
infusing neutralevents with positive meaning, as away of having a
few moments ofrelief from the intense stress.
Sometimes the creation of thesemeaningful events depended onthe
caregivers ability to find hu-mor in the situation. Humor, whichhas
long been recognized for itstension-reducing properties
(e.g.,Menninger, 1963), has the addedbenefit of generating positive
emo-tion in the very darkest of mo-ments, which may, in turn,
helpbuild social bonds that can be ben-eficial under conditions of
stress.The term gallows humor attests tothe widespread use of humor
insituations that are particularly grim.Humor was common in the
ac-counts provided by caregivers,even the accounts that
describedpartners deaths. The humor usu-ally managed to capture
positivequalities of the dying partner in aloving manner, which had
the ad-ditional benefit of helping the care-giver create images of
the partnerthat he wanted to remember.
COMPELLINGUNANSWEREDQUESTIONS
Research on coping and positiveemotions is still in its
earlieststages, and each new finding raises
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new questions. For example, re-searchers have only begun to
un-derstand the adaptive functions ofpositive emotions in the midst
ofstressful circumstances. Laboratorystudies have provided
provocativesuggestions regarding the wayspositive emotions may help
peopleendure stress (e.g., Fredrickson &Levenson, 1998). But
because con-straints of the laboratory limit re-searchers ability
to simulate themeaning or duration of seriousreal-life stressors,
we strongly en-courage pursuing research underreal-life
circumstances, with alltheir complexity. In our newlylaunched study
of maternal care-givers, for example, we are investi-gating
positive emotions and rel-evant coping processes in the dailylives
of women providing care for achild with HIV or other seriouschronic
illness.
There are several issues regard-ing measurement and
conceptual-ization of emotion that need tobe addressed in order to
advanceknowledge of the role of positiveemotion in the stress
process. Atthis point, there is little in the lit-erature about the
intensity andduration of positive emotions nec-essary to activate
their adaptivefunctions during stress. In ourstudy of AIDS-related
caregiving,the quantitative measures assessedthe frequency of
emotions, nottheir duration or intensity. Butqualitative data
suggested thatpositive emotions were less intenseand less enduring
than negativeemotions (Folkman et al., 1997). Itmay be that it is
the frequency ofpositive emotion, and not its inten-sity or
duration, that confers ben-efits on the individual.
A related issue has to do withwhether different positive
emo-tions are differentially effectivewith respect to motivating
and sus-taining coping, and if so, underwhat circumstances. For
example,is excitement more adaptive thanhappiness at the outset of
a stress-
ful undertaking, but less so whilethe situation unfolds?
Answering these questions re-garding intensity, duration,
anddifferential effects of positive emo-tions will require close
attention tothe measurement and conceptual-ization of emotion.
Recent debatesregarding whether positive andnegative emotion are
independentor bipolar constructs (i.e., oppositeextremes of the
same construct)have reignited interest in these is-sues (see
Russell & Carroll, 1999,for a review). As Russell and Car-roll
(1999) noted, when all the mea-surement issues are considered,
abipolar model fits the data best. Bymaking the assertion that
bothpositive and negative emotion oc-cur in chronically stressful
situa-tions, we are not implying thatthey are independent and that
atany given moment high levels ofnegative emotion co-occur withhigh
levels of positive emotion.Rather, our point is that over a pe-riod
of time, people in stressfulsituations experience not only
neg-ative emotion, but also positiveemotion. Thus, in the case of
ourcaregiver study, when participantsreported their emotions over
theprevious week, as expected, theyindicated that they experienced
fre-quent negative affect, but they alsoexperienced fairly frequent
posi-tive affect.
The coping processes that are as-sociated with positive emotion
in-volve another set of questions. Arethe coping processes that
generatepositive emotion truly differentfrom those that regulate
distress? Ifso, how are they different? For ex-ample, many of the
positive reap-praisal processes that generatepositive emotion
depend on the in-dividuals ability to access deeplyheld values that
enhance the per-sonal significance of ongoing cop-ing activity. In
contrast, copingprocesses that people are morelikely to use to
regulate distress(such as escape-avoidance or dis-
tancing), or even strategies that areintended to reduce tension
(such asrelaxation or meditation), do notseem to depend on
accessing val-ues in the same way. Further workthat specifically
addresses the dis-tinction between coping processesthat are
associated with positive asopposed to negative emotions isclearly
needed. If the ways of cop-ing that decrease negative emotiondiffer
from those that increase posi-tive emotion, it may be necessaryfor
researchers to expand the rep-ertoire of coping measures in orderto
more fully tap into these positiveways of coping.
Another set of questions con-cerns the importance of the
dura-tion of stress, and whether thecapacity or need for positive
emo-tions differs in acute versus chronicstressful situations. Does
the nov-elty, immediacy, or urgency of thedemands of an acute
stressful situ-ation reduce the persons capac-ity for engaging in
the copingstrategies that generate positiveemotions? Or perhaps it
is not asimportant to generate positiveemotions during an acute,
time-limited situation as it is when astressful situation persists
overtime, and the person needs to haverespite from distress to
become re-dedicated to the coping efforts inorder to keep going.
Studies di-rectly comparing coping withacute, relatively
short-lived stress-ors and coping with chronic stress-ors are
necessary to answer thisquestion.
Finally, to what extent can peoplebe taught to generate positive
emo-tions while they are also regulatingdistress? Is the ability to
generatepositive emotions attached to un-derlying personality
dimensions,such as optimism, that may be rela-tively immutable? Or
are thereteachable skills that are indepen-dent of the underlying
personalitydimensions? Lewinsohn and hiscolleagues recognized the
impor-tance of pleasant events (and the
117CURRENT DIRECTIONS IN PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE
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associated positive emotions) inthe treatment of depression
yearsago (e.g., Lewinsohn, Sullivan, &Grosscup, 1980). More
recent workhas pursued the idea that helpingclients identify
thoughts and be-liefs that interfere with positive ex-periences is
an important compo-nent of therapy (Fava, Rafanelli,Cazzaro, Conti,
& Grandi, 1998).
We have highlighted some ofthe exciting new developments inthe
areas of stress, positive emo-tions, and coping. These
develop-ments point the way for systematic,programmatic research
that mayhelp explain the fascinating, funda-mental question,
namely, why it isthat some people not only surviveadversity
mentally and physically,but manage somehow even tothrive.
Recommended Reading
Folkman, S. (1997). (See References)Fredrickson, B.L. (1998).
(See Refer-
ences)
Tedeschi, R.G., Park, C.L., & Cal-houn, L.G. (Eds.). (1998).
(SeeReferences)
AcknowledgmentsThis research wassupported by Grants 49985 and
52517from the National Institute of MentalHealth, and by Grant
58069 from the Na-tional Institute of Mental Health and theNational
Institute of Nursing Research.
Note
1. Address correspondence to SusanFolkman, 74 New Montgomery,
Suite600, San Francisco, CA 94105;
e-mail:[email protected].
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