The reasons why we are optimistic about 2021
After a year to forget, 40 well-known figures tell us why they’re feeling positive about the future
Brighter days will follow
Credit: Illustration: Ellice Weaver for the telegraph
Is there too much negativity in the world? If there is, it’s probably our fault – the media, that is. Famously in the hard-hearted world of journalism, “if it bleeds it leads,” and our tendency to highlight bad news may have made an objectively terrible year seem even worse.
Scary headlines hold our attention because of negativity bias – the human desire not only to seek out bad news but to give it more credence. It’s why people remain scared of plane crashes when 99.99997 per cent of commercial flights land safely, and why the majority of people think extreme poverty is rising when it’s falling fast. (In one survey, only one per cent of respondents knew that it had decreased by half in 20 years. The rest were too pessimistic.)