Frankfurt (Main), Universiẗat, Diss., 2007.

Universiẗat, Diss.--Greifswald, 2007.

n recent years, self-knowledge and optimism have been considered phenomena helping men succeed. The diploma thesis was aimed at investigating whether selected successful managers possess self-knowledge and optimism, and whether these phenomena might help them be successful. The subjects were the finalists of the competition Manager of the Year 2014. Semi-structured interviews were used as a method in the research. The diploma thesis concludes that the selected managers possess high levels of self-knowledge in certain areas. They use methods for raising self-knowledge such as experience, behavior reflections, or raising self-knowledge through other people. The managers find self-knowledge important for reasons such as: setting a direction in life, setting goals, managing people, or developing self-control. The data analysis included the comparison of the managers in areas of self-knowledge, optimism and mindset.

This thesis deals with the relationship between mood and behavior of bettors using a dataset provided by a betting company, Chance a.s., which operates in the Czech Republic. We consider three types of proxies for the mood: weather in regions, sport successes and the results of elections, and we build a fixed effect model to estimate the effect of mood on betting behavior. We provide strong evidence that the weather proxy has a significant effect on daily turnovers of the betting company and there also seems to be an effect of sport optimism. On the contrary, we failed to find any impact of elections. The results show that better mood tend to discourage clients from sports and lottery betting which is consistent with the increase in risk aversion or the depletion of a common self-control resource due to active mood regulation attempts. Additionally, we provide an evidence that the intra-month cycle in turnovers corresponds to liquidity constraint of bettors which disproves the permanent income hypothesis.

Der Zusammenhang zwischen Selbstregulation und subjektivem Wohlbefinden in Abhängigkeit von der Persönlichkeit und Optimismus wurde an einer Gruppe Medizinstudenten im 2. Semester untersucht. Selbstregulation versteht sich dabei als Verhaltensregulation nach dem Model von Charles Carver und Michael Scheier. Das erfasste subjektive Wohlbefinden beruht auf der Theorie von Carol D. Ryff. Es wurde erwartet, dass Personen mit besseren Selbstregulationsfähigkeiten höheres Wohlbefinden angeben. Direkte und indirekte Effekte von sowohl Persönlichkeit, in Form der Big Five Dimensionen und der Persönlichkeitsprototypen, als auch den Ausprägungen von Optimismus und Pessimismus auf das subjektive Wohlbefindenwurden angenommen. Indirekte Effekte werden dabei wiederum über die Selbstregulationsfähigkeit vermittelt. Im Wesentlichen bestätigten sich die erwarteten Zusammenhänge. Ausnahmen bildeten die signifikant höheren Angaben überkontrollierter Personen bezüglich Wachstum als Person und Selbst-Akzeptanz. Zudem zeigte sich in der Mediatoranalyse ein stärkerer Einfluss vom positiven Affekt auf das subjektive Wohlbefinden als von Persönlichkeit und Selbstregulation.

The thesis deals with a resistance to a psychological stress at cyclists with disabilities in context of addictive substances use. The theoretical part of the thesis summarizes findings concerning handicapped people cycling, personal characteristics of sportsmen, and also an influence of a sports performance by used substances together with an institutional framework of this issue. In the theoretical part there are described various views of the resistance to the psychological stress with an emphasis on an arousability, dispositional optimism and Sense of Coherence. A score of these three indicators was determined at respondents within an empirical part of the thesis. The aim of the thesis was to define a level of a psychological resistance at cyclists with disabilities and its relation to the addictive substances use. Partial aims of the thesis were focused on respondents´ awareness of effects of addictive substances on the sports performance, particular substances used by respondents, an openness to the addictive substances use to influence the sports performance and views of such a use in the sports environment. Scales of the arousability, Optimism Scale and Sense of Coherence, detecting levels of the arousability, dispositional optimism and Sense of Coherence, were applied in the research investigation. The research sample consisted of men ? cyclists with physical or sense handicaps, participating in cycle racing disciplines in the Czech Republic. Three hypotheses were tested in this investigation. The empirical part of the thesis has led to conclusions concerning a level of the psychological resistance at cyclists with disabilities from aspects of the Sense of Coherence, arousability and dispositional optimism. A frequency of the addictive substances use to influence the sports performance was in accordance with a predetermined hypothesis, the research sample of cyclists with disabilities showed a lower use of addictive substances to influence the sports performance compared to the cyclists without disabilities. Similarly, the openness to the addictive substances use was lower at the research sample.

Die vorliegende Arbeit untersucht in welchem Ausmaß Manager Optimismus finanzielle Entscheidungen von Unternehmen beeinflusst. Der erste Teil der Dissertation analysiert den Einfluss von Optimismus auf die Ausgabe von Fremdkapital. Optimistische Manager überschätzen die zukünftigen Erfolgsaussichten ihrer Firma. Daher könnten sie Verträge bevorzugen, die die Kuponzahlungen an die zukünftige Entwicklung des Kreditrisikos koppeln (sogenannte PSD Verträge). Diese Hypothese wird empirisch bestätigt. Ein weiteres Ergebnis der empirischen Analysen ist, dass in Firmen mit optimistischen Managern die Kreditqualität nach Ausgabe von PSD sinkt. Der zweite Teil untersucht den Zusammenhang zwischen Manager Optimismus und Spekulation mit Finanzderivaten in Unternehmen. Optimistische Manager, die ihre Fähigkeiten generell überschätzen, könnten irrtümlicherweise denken, dass sie mit Hilfe von Derivaten in der Lage sind den Markt zu schlagen und abnormale Renditen zu erzielen. Die Studie untersucht Derivatetransaktionen von Goldproduzenten in Nordamerika. Diese Industrie ist besonders interessant durch die ausführliche Ausweisung der Derivatepositionen und durch das klare Exposure zum Goldpreisrisiko. Das Ergebnis der Studie bestätigt die Hypothese dass optimistische Manager in größerem Ausmaß spekulieren und mit den Spekulationen letztendlich Verluste produzieren. Der letzte Teil der Arbeit untersucht die Auszahlungspolitik von Firmen mit optimistischen Managern. Optimistische Manager überschätzen durch ihre verzerrte Wahrnehmung den Wert der Firma und sollten daher eher zu Aktienrückkäufen als zu Dividendenzahlungen neigen. Die empirischen Ergebnisse der Arbeit bestätigen diese Voraussage. Optimistische Manager ersetzen Dividenden mit Aktienrückkäufen, das absolute Niveau der Auszahlungen unterscheidet sich jedoch nicht zwischen Firmen mit optimistischen und rationalen Managern. / This work analyses the impact of managerial optimism on financial policies of firms. The first part investigates the effect of optimism on debt contract design. Optimistic managers overestimate the credit quality of their firms and should be more likely to issue debt contracts that link coupon payments to the future credit risk of their firms (PSD contracts). This prediction is confirmed empirically. Further, firms with optimistic managers that issue PSD experience future deteriorations in their credit quality. The second part analyses the relation between managerial optimism and corporate speculation with financial derivatives. Optimistic managers overestimate their abilities and should be more likely to time markets because they believe that they have superior market timing abilities. The study uses data on North American gold producers because these firms disclose detailed data on their derivative positions and have a clear exposure to the gold price. The empirical results confirm the prediction that optimistic engage in more speculation with financial derivatives and that the cash flow resulting from speculation is lower relative to firms with rational managers. The last past analyses the relation between managerial optimism and a firm’s payout policy. As a consequence of their biased beliefs, optimistic managers perceive their firm’s equity as undervalued and should therefore be more likely to prefer share repurchases over cash dividends. The empirical analyses confirm this prediction: Firms with optimistic managers use more share repurchases relative to firms with rational managers. However, the total amount of payouts does not differ between firms with optimistic and rational managers.

This work deals with positive thinking and its impact on quality of the life. The theoretical part describes positive thinking, what affects it, and if is the possibility to change the thinking. It further describes concept of quality of the life and with it the most associated term the Health. In following chapters, I deal with concepts of optimism, pessimism, and the conclusion of theoretical work form chapters about failure, success and goals.The practical part contains data obtained from the questionnaire, which is aimed on finding the quality of life. To determine the quality of life was used assessment method named SEIQoL (KŘIVOHLAVÝ, 2001). Another part of the research includes interviews with selected individuals and finding a way of thinking by using the scale of prevailing way of thinking (Slezáčková, 2012). In selected individuals are results of SEIQoL methods compared with the results of the scale prevailing way of thinking.

This thesis focuses on the topic self-acceptance in order to describe the contemporary place of this phenomenon in the context of well-being. The aim is to extent the knowledge of accepting relationship to the self thanks to comparison with other, relevant concepts. The theoretical part of this work introduces the actual conception of positive psychology, the latest aproaches to well- being and is also about the topic self-system. There are also describe concepts as self-acceptance, self-copassion, internalized shame a dispositional optimism. In the empirical part, there is examined the research hypotheses about existence the relationships between unconditional self- acceptance and other concepts, which are measured by czech translations of these questionnaire methods: Unconditional Self-Acceptance Questionnaire (USAQ), Self-Compassion Scale (SCS-CZ), Internalized Shame Scale (ISS) a Life Orientation Test - Revised (LOT-R). It was conducted on the sample of 215 respondents od czech population. Results show the statistically significant relationship between unconditional self-acceptance and all the other concepts. There was further found high correlation between self-compassion and internalized shame and middle correlation between self-compassion and dispositional optimism. Also statistically...

Among other factors, optimism has been shown to significantly influence the course of some diseases (cancer, HIV, coronary heart disease). This study investigated whether optimism of a patient before a total hip replacement can predict the functionality of the lower limbs 3 and 6 months after surgery. A total of 325 patients took part in the study (age: 58.7 years; w: 55%). The functionality was measured with the Western Ontario and McMaster Universities arthrosis index, and optimism with the Life Orientation Test. To analyse the influences of age, gender and optimism, general linear models were calculated. In optimistic patients, functionality improved significantly over time. The study showed a clear influence of dispositional optimism on the recovery after total hip replacement in the first 3 months after surgery.