Happiness

About: Happiness is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 22093 publications have been published within this topic receiving 728411 citations. The topic is also known as: joy & happy.

The evolution of happiness.

Abstract: An evolutionary perspective offers novel insights into some major obstacles to achieving happiness. Impediments include large discrepancies between modern and ancestral environments, the existence of evolved mechanisms "designed" to produce subjective distress, and the fact that evolution by selection has produced competitive mechanisms that function to benefit one person at the expense of others. On the positive side, people also possess evolved mechanisms that produce deep sources of happiness: those for mating bonds, deep friendship, close kinship, and cooperative coalitions. Understanding these psychological mechanisms--the selective processes that designed them, their evolved functions, and the contexts governing their activation--offers the best hope for holding some evolved mechanisms in check and selectively activating others to produce an overall increment in human happiness.

Beyond Therapy: Biotechnology And The Pursuit Of Happiness

Abstract: This clear, concise, and groundbreaking report examines the reach, and potential, of biotechnology in every aspect of our daily life. Healthy children, superior physical performance, age longevity, overall happiness our desires and the emerging means to fulfill them raise a host of ethical challenges. Accompanied by a foreword by Leon R. Kass, an introduction by renowned columnist William Safire, and additional comments from member scientists on the President's Council on Bioethics, this report considers those possibilities in all their breadth and complexity. Most government reports . . . are guaranteed to put you to sleep at night. This one will keep you awake. Alan Murray, "Wall Street Journal" Draws attention to the power of commercial enterprise to shape people s desires. Nicolas Wade, "New York Times""

The mystery of the U-shaped relationship between happiness and age

Abstract: In this paper, we address the puzzle of the relationship between age and happiness Whilst the majority of psychologists have concluded there is not much of a relationship at all, the economic literature has unearthed a possible U-shape relationship with the minimum level of satisfaction occurring in middle age (35–50) In this paper, we look for a U-shape in three panel data sets, the German Socioeconomic Panel (GSOEP), the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS) and the Household Income Labour Dynamics Australia (HILDA) We find that the raw data mainly supports a wave-like shape that only weakly looks U-shaped for the 20–60 age range That weak U-shape in middle age becomes more pronounced when allowing for socio-economic variables When we then take account of selection effects via fixed-effects, however, the dominant age-effect in all three panels is a strong happiness increase around the age of 60 followed by a major decline after 75, with the U-shape in middle age disappearing such that there is almost no change in happiness between the age of 20 and 50

The religion paradox: if religion makes people happy, why are so many dropping out?

Abstract: As we estimate here, 68% of human beings--4.6 billion people--would say that religion is important in their daily lives. Past studies have found that the religious, on average, have higher subjective well-being (SWB). Yet, people are rapidly leaving organized religion in economically developed nations where religious freedom is high. Why would people leave religion if it enhances their happiness? After controlling for circumstances in both the United States and world samples, we found that religiosity is associated with slightly higher SWB, and similarly so across four major world religions. The associations of religiosity and SWB were mediated by social support, feeling respected, and purpose or meaning in life. However, there was an interaction underlying the general trend such that the association of religion and well-being is conditional on societal circumstances. Nations and states with more difficult life conditions (e.g., widespread hunger and low life expectancy) were much more likely to be highly religious. In these nations, religiosity was associated with greater social support, respect, purpose or meaning, and all three types of SWB. In societies with more favorable circumstances, religiosity is less prevalent and religious and nonreligious individuals experience similar levels of SWB. There was also a person-culture fit effect such that religious people had higher SWB in religious nations but not in nonreligious nations. Thus, it appears that the benefits of religion for social relationships and SWB depend on the characteristics of the society.

Best laid schemes : the psychology of emotions

Abstract: List of figures and tables Acknowledgments Prologue Part I. Theory and Function: 1. The structure of emotions 2. Intuitive and empirical approaches to understanding 3. Rationality and emotions 4. Mutual plans and social emotions Part II. Conflict and Unpredictability: 5. Plans and emotions in fictional narrative 6. Stress and distress 7. Freud's cognitive psychology of intention: the case of Dora Part III. Enjoyment and Creativity: 8. Happiness 9. Putting emotions into words Epilogue Notes References Author index Subject index.