As we grow, our families hope that we remain healthy, feel satisfied with our careers, have satisfying friendships and romantic relationships, and feel positive overall about our lives. Are there factors that might impact the transition from adolescence to adulthood, ensuring we feel positive about these life transitions? Absolutely. 

What is Affect?

Research suggests that a teen’s affect, particularly positive affect, is a critical factor impacting positive outlook. So what is affect? It’s the tendency to express positive or negative emotions, which in turn influences how we experience things and determine whether to judge a given situation as positive or negative. 

Affective responses to events usually happen automatically. Kansky and colleagues (2016) found that one’s affect remains stable over time, especially as adults. We typically look at affect as positive or negative, and having a positive affect is related to a number of positive outcomes in adulthood.

Research Support

To support this, researchers at the University of Virginia followed teenagers from ages 14 to 25, exploring the predictive power of positive affect across the developmental transition from adolescence to young adulthood. The study found that positive affect was strongly predictive of life outcomes in young adulthood, such as developing better intimate relationships and friendships. Kansky et al. (2016) found adolescents with greater positive affect reported healthier attachments in adulthood amongst friends and romantic partners. Both those in the study and their friends and romantic partners reported this as well, so both sides felt this way! 

 What Does It All Mean? 

So what did the researchers make of these findings? According to Fredrickson’s broaden-and-build theory (2004) , an evolutionary purpose of positive emotions is to broaden and build our resources for the future. Positive emotions can evoke play activities with others and build social connections. Therefore, positive emotions can help foster the development of close attachments to others. These relationships can then be used to help us cope with and overcome stressful life events and challenges.

The results of this research also suggested that positive affect goes beyond helping teens build positive relationships. Positive affect also predicted increased self-worth and job competence, suggesting that positive affect seems to be a major predictor of young adult success across several important areas of functioning.

 Negative Affect

So then what about negative affect? The same researchers found having greater negative affect did not have any significant associations with any of the later life outcomes. So what’s important to consider is that a positive affect can lead to positive life outcomes in areas such as our careers, relationships, and overall well-being.  

Want to shift your affect from negative to positive? Click here for support.