Sesgo Cognitivo de Optimismo y Percepción de Bienestar en una Muestra de Universitarios Ecuatorianos

The purpose of our research was to determine the relation between the cognitive bias of optimism and subjective and psychological wellbeing in a sample of Ecuadorian university students. To that effect, a cross-cutting, correlational, descriptive study was implemented. Questionnaires regarding life satisfaction, positive and negative affects, psychological wellbeing, life orientation, and vision for the future were applied in sample of 400 participants (67% women and 33% men), average age 21.3, studying in a public university (66.5%) and a co-financed university (37.5%) in the city of Ambato, Ecuador. According to the results, dispositional optimism is correlated with life satisfaction (r=.378), positive affects (r=.357) and negative affects (r=-.413), and psychological wellbeing (r=.616), while the illusory optimism (r=.221) and the illusion of invulnerability biases (r=-.235) are correlated only with psychological wellbeing. We conclude that there is evidence of bounded rationality as a result of biases that promote wellbeing.