What is hope, and how does it affect mental health?

Introduction

For centuries, people have contemplated the meaning of hope. Because hope is an abstract idea, definitions have varied according to diverse factors, including cultural, spiritual, and psychological needs to secure what people believe hope represents. The essence of hope frequently reflects wishes for accomplishments or objects that fulfill people or help them achieve behaviors compatible with societal demands. Secular and religious literature has depicted hope mostly with positive attributes, although some portrayals, such as the Pandora myth, hint of hope’s ambiguities. Hope is often equated with resilience, while hopelessness is associated with despair. Until the mid-twentieth century, many psychology researchers resisted studying hope scientifically because they considered it difficult to define and quantify.

Hope Theories

In 1959, Karl Menninger spoke about the need for psychiatrists to study and incorporate hope in therapy during his presidential presentation at an American Psychiatric Association meeting. Jerome Frank emphasized the importance of hope for effective psychotherapy in a 1968 International Journal of Psychiatry article. Hope theory research, representing positive psychology, emerged throughout the latter half of the twentieth century. Erik H. Erikson hypothesized that hope, which he said started forming at birth, was essential for development of cognition. Ezra Stotland wrote The Psychology of Hope (1969), exploring his premise that people’s expectations to meet valued goals influenced their experiences with hope.

By the 1980’s, Sara Staats had stated that hope involved both emotion and cognition. At the University of Kansas, C. R. Snyder began developing a hope theory to assist his patients in recognizing ways to pursue their goals. In the 1990’s, he outlined three components of hope. First, people identify goals, representing daily activities or more complicated endeavors. Next, people use their cognition skills to recognize pathways they can follow in pursuit of goals. Third, people need agency, demonstrating the motivation and perseverance required to engage in pathways, for goal resolution. All three cognitive elements are essential to Snyder’s hope theory.

Obstacles, including negative emotions, attitudes, and experiences, affect whether people believe they can complete goals. People with high hope often pursue several goals simultaneously, express confidence in their abilities, and excel in school, athletics, or work. Hope also aids people to cope with such medical concerns as cancer. Imbalanced hope theory components can frustrate people who are unsure how to attain their goals or lack sufficient motivation. Although hope can empower people, psychology professionals recognize the absence of hope can impair mental health and result in depression.

In the early twenty-first century, research in hope theory has considered topics such as the positive or negative impact of unexpected events on hope. Emotions produced when people react to emergencies or other traumatic occurrences can motivate them to achieve goals such as fleeing danger or assisting injured people.

Measuring Hope

Mental health professionals use hope measurement to provide patients effective therapy that enhances existing hope or counters helplessness. In the April, 1975, Journal of Clinical Psychology, Richard Erickson, Robin Post, and Albert Paige introduced their Hope Scale, inspired by Stotland’s scholarship. In this scale, people use a seven-point scale to respond to twenty goal statements. They also assign numerical values from one to one hundred to rate how attainable they perceive each goal to be.

During the 1980’s, Staats developed the Expected Balance Scale (EBS) to evaluate adults’ emotion-based hope with responses to a list of eighteen items, equally divided between negative and positive statements. Staats and Marjorie Stassen measured cognitive aspects with the Hope Index, which included sixteen items that people ranked in four categories: hope for themselves, hope for others, wishes, and expectations.

In the 1990’s, Snyder developed several hope measurement tests. The Adult Dispositional Hope Scale consists of twelve statements to assess pathways and agency. The Children’s Hope Scale (CHS), with six items quantified by a six-point scale, is for children age seven through sixteen. Snyder’s Domain Specific Hope Scale focuses on relationship goals or other precise concerns. His Young Children’s Hope Scale (YCHS) evaluated children age five to seven.

Other hope tests for adults include the Miller Hope Scale, created by nurses Judith Miller and M. J. Powers; the thirty-two item Herth Hope Index, designed by A. K. Herth; and the Nowotny Hope Scale, established by Mary Nowotny to assess hope in people enduring stress. Some psychologists observed patients’ actions pursuing goals to measure hope. In the June, 1974, Archives of General Psychiatry, Louis Gottschalk described evaluating verbal samples for hope. Mary Vance devised the Narrative Hope scale in the 1990’s to examine stories for references to pathways and agency. Hope measurement scales were frequently translated into Asian or European languages and adapted for compatibility with distinct cultures, such as a Norwegian version of the Herth Hope Index.

Bibliography

Lopez, Shane J., C. R. Snyder, and Jennifer Teramoto Pedrotti. “Hope: Many Definitions, Many Measures.” In Positive Psychological Assessment: A Handbook of Models and Measures, edited by Lopez and Snyder. Washington, D.C.: American Psychological Association, 2003. Summarizes hope theory developments and researchers’ efforts to quantify hope. Diagram, tables, appendixes, bibliography.

Reading, Anthony. Hope and Despair: How Perceptions of the Future Shape Human Behavior. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004. Psychiatrist Reading discusses cognitive, emotional, and physiological processes associated with hope and hopelessness. Figures, endnotes, bibliography.

Snyder, C. R., ed. Handbook of Hope: Theory, Measures, and Applications. San Diego, Calif.: Academic Press, 2000. Comprehensive source addresses gender, age, and ethnicity factors and how hope helps people recovery from injuries and helps relieve pain.

Snyder, C. R., Diane McDermott, William Cook, and Michael A. Rapoff. Hope for the Journey: Helping Children Through Good Times and Bad. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1997. Stresses storytelling’s role in hope development. Discusses parents’ and teachers’ responsibilities. Appendices suggest children’s literature with hope themes and provide a story version of the YCHS.

Snyder, C. R., Kevin L. Rand, and David R. Sigmon. “Hope Theory: A Member of the Positive Psychology Family.” In Handbook of Positive Psychology, edited by Snyder and Shane J. Lopez. 2d ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. Compares hope theory with optimism, self-efficacy, self-esteem, and problem-solving theories. Includes three measurement scales.