The trackpoint (red thingie on the keyboard to control the mouse cursor) may be too sensitive for you; the mouse settings in the Cinnamon desktop environment (and possibly other DEs as well) don't affect the trackpoint much.

Here is what you can do, based on these AskUbuntu answers. For present-day Linux versions (2019), try this ($ indicates commands that you enter):

 $ xinput | grep -i trackpoint
 TPPS/2 Elan TrackPoint   id=12 

Note id=12 (may be different on your laptop).

 $ xinput --list-props 12
 ...
 libinput Accel Speed (300):     0.000000
 libinput Accel Speed Default (301):     0.000000
 ...

Experiment with the Speed setting; negative values allowed. For example,

$ xinput --set-prop 12 'libinput Accel Speed' -0.25

Once you're satisfied, add the command as a startup application (typically under Start menu > Preferences > Startup). Note that the id numbering may change if you have an external mouse plugged in at login time. The following command is more reliable:

xinput --set-prop $( xinput | perl -ne '/TrackPoint.*id=(\d+)/ && print $1;' ) 'libinput Accel Speed' -0.25