 For starters, negativity and positivity are pretty broad terms with a quite permeable boundary. But still, let's assume this negativity bias as described by Baumeister and Tierney is real, at least to a large degree, in many areas. If that's the case, just how much stronger is bad than good? In general, it takes about four good things to overcome one bad thing. Now, that's a rule of thumb. It doesn't apply to every kind of thing, but it's a good thing to keep in mind