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**Original citation.** Armor, D.A., Massey, C., & Sackett, A.M. 2008. Prescribed optimism: Is it right to be wrong about the future? *Psychological Science, 19*, 329-331. <br> <hr> **Target of replication.** People tend to make optimistically biased predictions about their personal futures, which conflicts with the assumption that our primary goal is to be accurate in our predictions. We plan to reproduce Armor, Massey, and Sackett’s (2008) finding that people believe optimistically-based predictions are ideal. In addition to performing this replication at the University of Oregon, an American university closely resembling the sampling of the target study, we will also sample at Tilburg University in the Netherlands to examine potential cross-cultural differences. <br> <hr> **A priori replication criteria.** The replication will be considered a success if people score above the mid-point of the prescribed-optimism measure. The key sample is the sample from the University of Oregon; however, if the Dutch sample is not statistically different from the University of Oregon sample, then the samples will be combined. All of our selection criteria, analysis plan, and replication criteria are in the Files section of this project. <br> <hr> **Materials, Data, and Report.** Study materials can be found in the Methods and Measures component of this project (for [English materials][1]; for [Dutch materials][2]). Study data, syntax, and output can be found in the [Data, Syntax, and Output][3] component. The final report can be found [here][4]. <br> <hr> **Conclusions.** In both the UO and TU samples, participants clearly displayed a tendency to recommend optimistic, rather than pessimistic or even accurate predictions. The modal prescription was moderately optimistic, which was recommended about 1/3 more often than accurate prescription (33.6% vs. 20.7%). Based on the consistency of both the significance and the large effect size of the optimism finding, we conclude that this effect replicates the primary effect found by Armor and colleagues (2008). ![Boxplot][5] [1]: https://osf.io/ibhv7/wiki/home/ [2]: https://osf.io/78r4h/wiki/home/ [3]: https://osf.io/vqtza/wiki/home/ [4]: https://osf.io/8u5v2/ [5]: https://osf.io/qlzap/osffiles/boxplot.jpg/version/1/download/
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