No you are not mistaken, but there are good, empirical reasons for this attitude.

I don't think so. The behavior of "if at first you don't succeed" has obvious empirical backing, but there is more than one attitude that can generate that same behavior.

Some of those attitudes (like, "I'm a fun person and I like to meet a lot of new and interesting people", or "women are fascinating and I want to meet them all") have MUCH better effects on the person holding them, as well as better effects on the people they come into contact with.