____2. I’m less worried about HIV infection than I
used to be.
____3. New HIV treatments will take the worry out
of sex.
____4. If every HIV-positive person took the new
treatments, the AIDS epidemic would be over.
____5. If a cure for AIDS were announced, I would
stop practising safe sex.
____6. People with undetectable viral load do not need
to worry so much about infecting others
with HIV.
____7. Until there is a complete cure for HIV/AIDS,
prevention is still the best practice*.
____8. The availability of treatment (PEP) immediately
after unsafe sex makes safe sex less important.____9. HIV is less of a threat because the epidemic is
on the decline.
____10. HIV/AIDS is a less serious threat than it used
to be because of new treatments.
____11. It’s never safe to fuck without a condom
regardless of viral load.*
____12. Because of new treatments fewer people are
becoming infected with HIV.
Notes : Copyright r2000 Taylor and Francis. No portion
of the HIV Treatment Optimism Scale may be repro-
duced by any means without permission in writing from
the copyright owner.
*Item reverse scored.
Reproduced with permission.
FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS
As part of the conceptual bedrock of positive psychology, hope and optimism are integral to understanding
individuals’ perceptions and expectations for the future. Not surprisingly, many measures have been developed
to assess the positivity or negativity of these expectations. Although space permits only a limited discussion
of some of the more widely-used of these measures, it is clear that measures of hope generally reflect some level
of individual responsibility in bringing about a desired state. As such, measures of hope often assess feelings of
self-efficacy or motivational states that one can and will achieve a desired end goal. Conversely, measures of opti-
mism reflect an individual’s general belief that good things will happen. As such, measures of optimism tend to
assess a generalized expectancy of a desired end goal without self-efficacy or motivation that one can bring about
that state themselves. Of course, measures of hope and optimism do overlap in that both assess some positive
attitude, perception, or expectation for the future.
Although the measures discussed in this chapter purport to measure similar constructs, there is variability in
the nature of the items and response formats /C0even within the domains of hope and optimism themselves.
To date, there is little data demonstrating the inter-relations among these measures and no data demonstrating
the superiority of one measure over another. Nor is there data supporting the use of one measure among particu-
lar populations relative to others. Future research should attempt to address these limitations by explicitly exam-
ining response patterns and data patterns for the different measures together. Doing so could provide some
evidence of the preferability of one instrument over another in a given population.
Future research on hope and optimism should not only continue to develop explicit, questionnaire-based mea-
sures, but also consider developing implicit or unobtrusive measures of hope and optimism. As hope and opti-
mism seem to be desirable traits and/or states, it is possible that responses to self-report items may be subject to
evaluation apprehension. Indeed, the average hope and optimism scores in validation studies, discussed above,
seem to yield relatively high levels of these constructs. As the scales reviewed in this chapter wholly rely on
explicit self-report, participants may alter their responses consciously or unconsciously. Thus, measures using
implicit associations may provide useful in accessing both conscious and unconscious expectations relating to the
future. Similarly, unobtrusive observations or informant reports may provide an additional glimpse into indivi-
duals’ perceptions and expectations above and beyond what these individuals are willing to self-report.
In line with the current trend toward development of neurological profiles of positive psychological constructs
like savoring (e.g., Bryant, Chadwick, & Kluwe 2011 ), future research should consider the neurological basis of
hope and optimism. Theoretically, hope relies more on self-awareness, suggesting the importance of higher order
thought processes located in the prefrontal cortex, for example. Conversely, optimism might be more primal, sug-
gesting a deeper, more mammalian component to its neural profile. Future research should determine the regions
of interest in hope and optimism to further clarify and conceptually distinguish these distinct but related percep-
tions of the future. Considerable thought and effort has gone into developing the diverse measures of hope and71 FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS
II. EMOTIONAL DISPOSITIONS