Positivity: The Dispositional Basis of Happiness

The present study examined in a stringent developmental model whether positivity, conceptualized as a pervasive mode of appraising, viewing, and perceiving life from a positive stance, predicts chronic positive affectivity across time or vice versa. Participants [263 participants (47 % males)], aged 15.5 at the beginning of the study and 23.5 at the end, reported on measures of positivity and dispositional positive affect four times. Longitudinal findings corroborated the posited paths of relations, with positivity significantly predicting positive affectivity across time rather than vice versa.     

The Rationality of Happiness

Abstract

In his recent book, Happiness: personhood, community, purpose, Pedro Tabensky answers the question of what happiness is. He develops an Aristotelian account of happiness that, he claims, is everyone’s maximally rational ideal. Much of the support for this claim rests on what Tabensky calls the method of critical introspection. This method involves introspecting on the kind of beings that we are and the kind of lives we can thus lead. If properly carried out, Tabensky claims, critical introspection will reveal to any individual that the active life of virtue is in fact the maximally rational ideal. I argue that two features of Tabensky’s account undermine this claim. The first is his account of the method of critical introspection itself. The second is his account of the nature and acquisition of virtue developed in his analogy between living and painting, and in his discussion of the eudaimon community. Tabensky’s account of critical introspection carried out at the general level of persons shows only that it works negatively to identify the kind of lives we could not lead as persons. It does not function positively to reveal that the maximally rational life for any person is the active exercise of virtue. Tabensky does suggest that the method carried out by particular individuals will reveal the kind of life they should be leading. However, it follows from Tabensky’s account of the nature and acquisition of virtue, I argue, that critical introspection can only reveal the active life of virtue to be the maximally rational ideal for those individuals who have had the right sort of upbringing in the right sort of community.     

The Loreley of Happiness

Sara Ahmed has written a highly original book on happiness by not focusing on the content, but on the context in which the word happiness is used. Her chapters are titled Feminist Killjoys, Unhappy Queers, Melancholic Mirgants and Happy Futures. Ahmed convincingly shows that the pursuit of happiness may have unintended side-effects in different social contexts, and she has collected al lot of stories and ideas that provide a backbone for the book. The ideological critique provided by Ahmed would have been a lot stronger if she would have used data from empirical studies to judge her own ideas.     

The social origins of depression : By G.W. Brown and T. Harris: Its methodological philosophy

A preliminary assessment is made of the book from the point of view of ‘relative objectivism’, which is defined. The aim of the assessment is to decide whether it is worth while devoting the time that would be necessary for an assimilation of all the findings of a large scale and apparently thorough study. The eventual decision is against doing so. for five reasons: (i) the methods of selecting patients are open to contamination by the views of the investigators; (ii) the procedure for eliciting life events is unvalidated; (iii) the assessment of the severity of life events is based almost entirely upon the subjective judgements of a handful of investigators; (iv) the methods of analysing data appear to be selective and ambiguous; and (v) important conclusions often seem to be inconsistent with the findings. The causal theory of depression finally arrived at might still be worth considering on its own merits; but that is outside the scope of this paper.     

The Relationship Between Adult Happiness and Self-Appraised Childhood Happiness and Events

The primary purpose of the present research was to relate questionnaire-assessed self-reported childhood happiness and events to adulthood happiness in 387 nonclinical participants. Although childhood happiness and adult happiness were found to be significantly correlated (r = .28, p < .001), there was little relationship between reported adult happiness and reported specific childhood events and circumstances. Childhood events and circumstances, however, were much more highly correlated with childhood happiness (R = .64). Thirty-four percent of the persons who said they were unhappy or very unhappy as a child, but only 9% who said they were happy or very happy as a child, reported that they were unhappy or very unhappy as adults.     

Momentary Happiness: The Role of Psychological Need Satisfaction

Psychological well-being correlates positively with psychological need satisfaction—primarily the needs of autonomy, competence, and relatedness. The current study explores momentary happiness (defined as experienced enjoyment minus experienced stress over the course of an hour) as a function of momentary psychological need satisfaction. Results demonstrate that hour-by-hour ratings of psychological need satisfaction were correlated with momentary happiness, with individual differences in life satisfaction moderating this relationship. Ratings of autonomy and relatedness correlated positively with momentary happiness, while competence was negatively correlated with momentary happiness. Thus, engagement in competence-promoting behaviors may come at an affective cost, at least in the moment. When autonomy and relatedness needs were met, individuals with high levels of life satisfaction experienced greater increases in happiness than individuals with low levels of life satisfaction. This finding supports a sensitization model of well-being. Results are discussed with respect to their implications for self-determination theory (SDT).     

Searching for Happiness: The Importance of Social Capital

After four decades of research, scholars of happiness continue to debate its causes. While it is generally agreed that a combination of internal and external factors play a role, predicting happiness well remains a challenge. Recent research has proposed that social capital may be a vital factor that has been overlooked. This paper attempts to address that omission. According to Coleman’s (1988) seminal work, three dimensions of social capital exist: (1) trust and obligations, (2) information channels, and (3) norms and sanctions. Using bootstrap hierarchical regression on data from the Canadian General Social Survey of Social Engagement Cycle 17 (2003), we identified blocks of social capital variables described by Coleman, as well as an additional factor of belongingness. Even after controlling for major demographic and individual characteristics, the majority of these blocks show significant relationships with happiness. Our findings support social capital as an important piece in predicting happiness.