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We are often told in childhood that sticks and stones may break our bones, but words cannot hurt us. But as we get older and gain more experience, we realize that this is far from the truth - while physical wounds can take weeks to heal, the hurt from negative comments can last a lifetime.
type of bias, which means that negative emotions usually affect us much more strongly than positive ones. This causes us to pay special attention to threats and exaggerate dangers, says Professor Roy Baumeister, Professor of Social Psychology at the University of Queensland and co-author of The Power of Bad Things and How You Can Overcome Them.
Focusing on the darker side of the world around us may seem like a depressing sight, but in fact, it has helped us humans overcome many hardships, from natural disasters to epidemics and wars, by making us better equipped to deal with them (although there is evidence of Optimism can also help us protect ourselves from the stress we experience in times of adversity.
The human brain has evolved to protect our bodies and keep us alive, and it has three warning systems that enable it to deal with dangers. There is the ancient basal ganglia system, which controls what is known as the fight or flight response, the limbic system, which produces emotions in response to threats and helps us understand the danger, and there are the more modern frontal lobes, which enable us to think logically when faced with danger.
