The intermarriage of wisdom and selective optimization with compensation: Two meta-heuristics guiding the conduct of life.

Baltes, Paul B.; Freund, Alexandra M.

doi:10.1037/10594-011

Cited by 42 publications

(33 citation statements)

References 65 publications

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“…Similarly, if wisdom teaches the 'art of living' or how to lead a good life for oneself and others [Baltes & Freund, 2003;Baltes & Staudinger, 2000;Hart, 1987;Kekes, 1995;Kramer, 2000;Kunzmann & Baltes, 2003;Sternberg, 1998], it might be expected that the acquisition of wisdom is accompanied by a strengthening of positive personality characteristics, such as maturity, integrity, and generativity, and a weakening or transcendence of negative characteristics, such as neuroticism or selfcenteredness [Erikson, 1963;Erikson, Erikson, & Kivnick, 1986;Hart, 1987;Helson & Srivastava, 2002]. As a consequence, people who possess wisdom are assumed to know how to deal with intra-and interpersonal conflict and the vicissitudes of life [Kunzmann & Baltes, 2003].…”

Section: Expected Correlates Of Wisdommentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As a consequence, people who possess wisdom are assumed to know how to deal with intra-and interpersonal conflict and the vicissitudes of life [Kunzmann & Baltes, 2003]. They have found meaning, purpose, and contentment in life even if objective circumstances are less than ideal [Assmann, 1994;Baltes & Freund, 2003;Bianchi, 1994;Clayton, 1982;Dittmann-Kohli & Baltes, 1990;Kekes, 1995;Kramer, 2000;Kunzmann & Baltes, 2003;Sternberg, 1990b;Vaillant, 1993]. Human Development 2004;47:257-285 …”

Section: Expected Correlates Of Wisdommentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Even if it were true that wisdom per se could be found in books, how could this wisdom-related knowledge help individuals to live a life that is beneficial for themselves, others, and society at large [Baltes & Freund, 2003;Baltes, Glueck, & Kunzmann, 2002;Kunzmann & Baltes, 2003] without first transforming those individuals into wise(r) persons? According to Moody [1986, p. 142], 'one can have theoretical knowledge without any corresponding transformation of one's personal being.…”

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Wisdom as Expert Knowledge System: A Critical Review of a Contemporary Operationalization of an Ancient Concept

Ardelt¹

2004

Human Development

366

262

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Paul B. Baltes and his colleagues, who are among the most prominent contemporary wisdom researchers, define wisdom as ‘expert knowledge in the domain fundamental pragmatics of life.’ By contrast, this article argues that the definition, operationalization, and measurement of wisdom should not be reduced to expertise and that the term wisdom should be reserved for wise persons rather than expert knowledge. In fact, evidence from their research confirms that Baltes et al. primarily assess expert or intellectual knowledge in the wisdom domain ‘fundamental pragmatics of life’ rather than how wise people are. As an alternative, a model of wisdom is presented that defines, operationalizes, and measures wisdom as an integration of cognitive, reflective, and affective personality characteristics.

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Section: Expected Correlates Of Wisdommentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Expected Correlates Of Wisdommentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Wisdom as Expert Knowledge System: A Critical Review of a Contemporary Operationalization of an Ancient Concept

Ardelt¹

2004

Human Development

366

262

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“…Baltes, 1987;P. B. Baltes, 1997;Paul B. Baltes & Freund, 2003a, 2003b. We can flourish, but providing an explanation for how it is we do so will be difficult; it will be linked to context; it will be linked to time.…”

Section: Inter-individual Variability Produces Variability In Scientimentioning

confidence: 99%

Modest systems psychology: A neutral complement to positive psychological thinking

Hogan

2008

Syst. Res.

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Publication InformationHogan, M. J (2008) The positive psychology movement has recently reconfigured the thinking of psychologists by bringing to the forefront of enquiry a scientific focus on positive emotions, character strengths, and human virtue, the ultimate aim of which is to further our understanding of human nature and optimize our potential for a good life.This paper proposes a modest systems psychology as a neutral complement to positive psychological thinking in an effort to facilitate a systems view on action optimization. Modest Systems Psychology 3The challenge of modesty to joy "Some men and women, indeed, there are who can live on smiles and the word 'yes' forever. But for others (indeed for most), this is too tepid and relaxed a moral climate.Passive happiness is slack and insipid, and soon grows mawkish and intolerable.Some austerity and wintry negativity, some roughness, danger, stringency, and effort, some 'no! no!' must be mixed in, to produce the sense of an existence with character and texture and power. The range of individual differences in this respect is enormous; but whatever the mixture of yeses and noes may be, the person is infallibly aware when he has struck it in the right proportion for him. This, he feels, is my 1 A reviewer has asked me to substantiate the claim that William James was in fact a modest psychologist. A reading of his private correspondence suggests to me that he was (James & James, 1920). Other modest psychologists might wish to contest this claim.Modest Systems Psychology 4 proper vocation, this is the optimum, the law, the life for me to live. Here I find the degree of equilibrium, safety, calm, and leisure which I need, or here I find the challenge, passion, fight, and hardship without which my soul's energy expire".(James, 1902, p 299, original italics).Ultimately, William James is talking about the range of individual differences in human personality associated with optimization of positive experiences, and his own sentiment and experience leads him to believe that the laws describing the optimization of positive experiences will be different for everyone.Our vigorous pursuit after truth, our desire to understand the 'harmony' of the universe has spurred many thinkers on to discover and do great things 2 . For example, one byproduct of scientific discovery has been an exponential growth in novel technological developments (Pettersson, 1996) --and without sufficient interindividual variation no new niches would be carved and technology development at a population level would stagnate (Basalla, 1988;Odling-Smee, Laland, & Feldman, 2003).However, much like William James assumed, the mathematics describing human functioning -and the functioning of living systems generally -has turned out to be less orderly and harmonious, more dynamic, variable, and complex than are the mathematics describing concrete physical systems (Bertalanffy, 1968;Fischer & Bidell, 2006 Certainly, when it comes to behaving like a scientist, sentiment and formal logic are inextricably bou...

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“…Baltes and Freund (2003) define lifespan contextualism as … meant to identify knowledge that considers the many themes and contexts of life (e.g., education, family, work, friends, leisure, the public good of society, etc. ), their interrelations and cultural variations, and in addition, incorporates a lifetime temporal perspective (i.e., past, present, and future) (p. 252 -253).…”

Section: Lifespan Contextualismmentioning

confidence: 99%

An Exploration of Wisdom in Mid- to Older-Aged Adults: An Australian Context

Mitchell¹

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Wisdom is considered a multifaceted construct that has proven difficult to define, and within the psychological literature, wisdom has only been the focus of scientific study for the past 40 years, despite its long history within philosophy and society more generally. Research to date has focused on three core areas of study: defining wisdom; measuring wisdom; and developing wisdom.In this thesis, the focus is on the former two areas of study.The trend to date in terms of defining wisdom has been to delineate between Western and Eastern conceptualisations of wisdom in order to distinguish between the ways in which those two broad groups of people define wisdom. A further, more recent, development in the literature has been to begin explorations as to the potential for a culturally inclusive conceptualisation of wisdom.In terms of its assessment, theorists have measured wisdom in a variety of ways, with the two main methodologies being via performance-based measures (primarily achieved via the use of vignettes) and self-report measures. While each have proven reliability and validity, the former tends to require lengthy procedures and training, while the latter is plagued by concerns around how well an individual can rate their own 'level' of wisdom (Staudinger & Glück, 2011).The present research explored the construct of wisdom utilising Australian adult participants aged 50 years and over. Offering an interesting mix of cultures, Australia's multicultural population was seen as presenting the potential to build on the conceptualisation of wisdom research to date beyond the broad delineations of Western versus Eastern cultures. A further aim was to investigate a new measure of wisdom, drawing on the empirical literature to date as to what might make for a 'good' wisdom measure.Study 1 was a quantitative study looking at what Australians identify as the key defining qualities of a wise person. Using the Self-Construal Scale (Singelis, 1994) to distinguish between those identifying with an independent versus an interdependent value system, it was hypothesised that the former group would more closely match with Western definitions of wisdom, while the latter would more closely match with Eastern definitions. The results showed that regardless of selfidentified cultural background, participants rating highly in terms of an independent self-construal were more likely to rate wisdom descriptors associated with knowledge and intelligence highly.Those rating highly in terms of an interdependent self-construal tended to rate affective descriptors of wisdom more highly. In each case, these findings were consistent with research to date focusing on Western-and Eastern-based definitions of wisdom, respectively.Study 2 was a qualitative study that asked participants, in an open-ended way, to describe a wise person. The data was then matched to the work of Bangen, Meeks, and Jeste (2013) in order to see how well the responses of the participants aligned with the subcomponents of wisdom derived (iii) from their review ...

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The intermarriage of wisdom and selective optimization with compensation: Two meta-heuristics guiding the conduct of life.

Cited by 42 publications

References 65 publications

Wisdom as Expert Knowledge System: A Critical Review of a Contemporary Operationalization of an Ancient Concept

Wisdom as Expert Knowledge System: A Critical Review of a Contemporary Operationalization of an Ancient Concept

Modest systems psychology: A neutral complement to positive psychological thinking

An Exploration of Wisdom in Mid- to Older-Aged Adults: An Australian Context

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