︎

RESEARCH


︎

Study #1: Good fortune, luck, opportunity and their lack: How do agents perceive them?

André, Nathalie. “Good Fortune, Luck, Opportunity and Their Lack: How Do Agents Perceive Them?” Personality and Individual Differences, vol. 40, no. 7, 2006, pp. 1461–1472., doi:10.1016/j.paid.2005.10.022.

Findings:

Agents perceive dispositional luck in 3 ways:

1. As a personality trait, something one is born with, i.e. good fortune.

2. As a random event that one could run into in life i.e. luck

3. Non existent, supertitious, can be attained through hard work, i.e. opportunity.



Study #2: Dispositional optimism and luck attributions: implications for philosophical theories of luck

Hales, Steven D., and Jennifer Adrienne Johnson. “Dispositional Optimism and Luck Attributions: Implications for Philosophical Theories of Luck.” Philosophical Psychology, vol. 31, no. 7, 2018, pp. 1027–1045., doi:10.1080/09515089.2018.1474344.
Findings:

Johnson and Hales investigate the relationship between: dispositional optimism and the attribution of good and bad luck to ambiguous luck scenarios.

A strong correlation is found between optimism and perceived good luck. If you think you are lucky, you are. This can be applied to attributions of percieved good fortune and opportunity.

This means: there is no compelete truth behind any of the aforementioned attrubutions; rather, they serve as traits one believes about themselves and their situations, similar to personality traits.