The risks of professional music-making are equivalent to gambling, argue researchers GEORGE MUSGRAVE, SALLY ANNE GROSS and MAIKE KLEIN as they examine the relationship between optimism, risk and mental well-being among musicians.
Being a career musician is typified by high risk. Despite low earnings, many musicians pursue their careers driven by self-belief, high expectations, and optimism. However, failure to obtain the success many optimistically aspire to has been seen to pose psychosocial risks relating to mental health conditions such as anxiety and depression.
While studies have shown dispositional optimism as having many health-related benefits, it has also been conceptualized negatively in encouraging a tendency toward loss-making in one key area: gambling.
In this article, we develop the argument that the risks of professional music-making are analogous to gambling, and the optimism displayed by many aspiring career musicians may therefore represent a form of what Berlant calls cruel optimism, with negative effects on mental health and wellbeing...Keep reading on Sage Journals.
Being a career musician is typified by high risk. Despite low earnings, many musicians pursue their careers driven by self-belief, high expectations, and optimism. However, failure to obtain the success many optimistically aspire to has been seen to pose psychosocial risks relating to mental health conditions such as anxiety and depression.
While studies have shown dispositional optimism as having many health-related benefits, it has also been conceptualized negatively in encouraging a tendency toward loss-making in one key area: gambling.
In this article, we develop the argument that the risks of professional music-making are analogous to gambling, and the optimism displayed by many aspiring career musicians may therefore represent a form of what Berlant calls cruel optimism, with negative effects on mental health and wellbeing...Keep reading on Sage Journals.