Positive Emotions and Well-being, a Systematic Review on People with Perfectionism

Abstract

Objective: to analyze the scientific evidence available on the study of positive emotions in perfectionists, according to the evolutionary stage. In addition, studies that addressed the effects of experiencing these types of emotions on the well-being of perfectionists were examined. Method: a systematic review of those publications available in the databases Google Scholar, PLoS ONE, ResearchGate has been carried out. From a total of 115 bibliographic references detected, 19 articles that met the defined selection criteria were chosen. Results and Conclusions: most of the studies consulted show that positive emotions such as empathy, compassion and self-compassion have a negative relationship with maladaptive perfectionism. However, few studies have been found on these positive emotions, particularly in children and adolescents. Likewise, compared to self-compassion, empathy and compassion have been less studied in relation to perfectionism. Finally, the studies consulted indicate that adaptive perfectionism would be positively related to psychological well-being, while maladaptive perfectionism would be negatively associated with wellbeing.