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Optimists tend to focus on the positive aspects of life. In lay terms, they see the glass as “half full.” At times, this positivity can be taken to unrealistic extremes. For example, the philosopher Leibniz expressed the belief that we live in the “best of all possible worlds,” a view that was satirized in Voltaire’s (1759) Candide. Unrealistic optimism is associated with unhealthy behaviors and diminished emotional well-being (Shepperd et al., 2015). In its more moderate forms, however, optimism is typically considered as a virtue. In Western culture, optimism is a personal factor thought to lead to happier and healthier lives. Over the past several decades, behavioral scientists have studied the links between optimism and life outcomes. To date, the evidence suggests that greater optimism is associated with healthy reactions to adversity, adaptive coping, effective goal-directed striving, and physical and psychological well-being (Carver & Scheier, 2002; Scheier & Carver, 1992). Although the bulk of the extant evidence comes from populations without disability, the science of optimism offers important implications for the well-being of people with disabilities and their families and the extent to which they experience disability in their efforts to be active participants in their lives. For this chapter, we will focus on Scheier and Carver’s (1985) conceptualization of optimism as a generalized expectancy. That is, optimism is the expectation that good things, as opposed to bad things, will happen. This definition of optimism is explicitly anchored in the future. This anticipatory belief is hypothesized to influence how people pursue important life goals and cope with …