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.

Relational Goods, Sociability, and Happiness

Abstract: SUMMARYThis paper empirically investigates the impact of relational goods on individual life satisfaction. Byrelationalgoodsweindicatetheaffective/expressive,noninstrumental,sideofinterpersonalrelationships.Thehomooeconomicusviewofhumannatureisquestionedbytherecentupsurgeofempiricalstudiesonthedeterminantsofselfdeclared happiness,thatshowthatanincreasingincomedoesnotalwaysleadtomoresubjectivewellbeing(Easterlin’sfamous(1974)‘paradoxofhappiness’).Thetheoreticalliteratureonrelational goods has isolated various mechanisms which may induce an under-consumption and under-productionofrelationalgoods.Thehypothesiswetestisthatpeoplewithamoreintenserelationallifearelessaffectedbythis‘relationalpovertytrap’andarethereforehappier.Ourfindingsdoesnotdisproveourhypothesis: relational goods turn out to have significant and positive effects on self declared lifesatisfaction, when other determinants isolated in the literature as important are taken into account andwhen the . inverse causalitynexus i.e. from more happiness to a more intense relational life is also takenintoaccount.Finally,weshowthatgender,ageandeducationmatterandinparticularthattheeffectsofsociabilityonhappinessarestrongerforwomen,olderandlesseducatedindividuals.Thesefindingscanbeusefulindesigningandevaluatingpublicpolicieswithadirectorindirecteffectonthequalityandquantityof relational goods.

Aging Well: Surprising Guideposts to a Happier Life from the Landmark Harvard Study of Adult Development

Abstract: In an unprecedented series of studies, Harvard Medical School has followed 824 subjects-men and women, some rich, some poor- from their teens to old age. Harvard's George Vaillant now uses these studies, the most complete ever done anywhere in the world, and the subjects' individual histories to illustrate the factors involved in reaching a happy, healthy old age. He explains precisely why some people turn out to be more resilient than others, the complicated effects of marriage and divorce, negative personality changes, and how to live a more fulfilling, satisfying and rewarding life in the later years. He shows why a person's background has less to do with their eventual happiness than the specific lifestyle choices they make. And he offers step-by-step advice about how each of us can change our lifestyles and age successfully. Sure to be debated on talk shows and in living rooms, Vaillant's definitive and inspiring book is the new classic account of how we live and how we can live better.

Beyond GDP: Measuring Welfare and Assessing Sustainability

Abstract: Contents vii Preface ix Introduction: The four musketeers xi 1 A wealth of indicators 1 1.1 Introduction 1.2 A bird's eye view 1.3 Aggregating the non-aggregatable? 1.4 Correcting GDP 1.5 Sustainability assessment: weak or strong? 1.6 Coping with multidimensionality: dashboards 1.7 An overhanging question: how far can aggregation go? 2 Measuring sustainability 2.1 Introduction 2.2 Wealth and sustainable well-being 2.2.1 Discounting future streams of well-being? 2.2.2 From intertemporal well-being to sustainable consumption 2.3 The savings approach: a reference framework 2.3.1 Shifting the focus to sustainability : why? 2.3.2 Assessing sustainability in imperfect but predictable economies. 2.3.3 An example 2.4 The savings approach: several pending problems 2.4.1 Monetization in practice 2.4.2 Behavioral indeterminacy or when 'weak' indicators can turn out too strong 2.4.3 Technological and normative uncertainties 2.4.4 An additional problem: the cross-national dimension of unsustainability 2.5 Conclusion: where to go from there? iii iv CONTENTS 3 A price for everything? 3.1 A revealed preference argument 3.1.1 The argument for an individual consumer 3.1.2 Extending the argument to social welfare through a representative agent 3.1.3 Extending the argument to social welfare with an opti- mality assumption 3.2 A variant of the revealed preference argument 3.3 The theory of index numbers 3.3.1 An axiomatic approach 3.3.2 Approximating welfare changes 3.4 Decomposing welfare 3.4.1 A first decomposition, with the social expenditure function 3.4.2 A second decomposition, in terms of effeciency and equity 3.4.3 A new decomposition, based on Bergson curves 3.4.4 Another decomposition, for small variations 3.5 Specific problems with imputed prices and full income 3.6 Conclusion 4 Equivalent income, or how to value what has no price 4.1 Money-metric utility and equivalent income 4.2 Knock-out criticism? 4.2.1 Not welfarist enough 4.2.2 Too welfarist 4.2.3 Potentially regressive 4.2.4 Reference dependent 4.2.5 Arrow's coup de grace 4.3 Fairness to the rescue 4.3.1 The equivalence approach in fair allocation theory 4.3.2 Arrow Independence is not compelling 4.3.3 References need not be arbitrary 4.3.4 The right dose of welfarism 4.3.5 Bundle dominance is unacceptable 4.3.6 Egalitarianism is demanding 4.4 Social welfare decomposition 4.5 Conclusion 5 Is happiness all that matters? 5.1 The Easterlin paradox: Have we been wrong for 70,000 years? 5.1.1 Bentham is back 5.1.2 The debate about subjective welfarism 5.1.3 Is happiness the ultimate goal? 5.1.4 The key objection to subjective scores 5.2 A theory of subjective well-being 5.2.1 A[currency]ects and judgments 5.2.2 The three problems of the respondent CONTENTS v 5.2.3 Heterogeneous and shifting standards 5.2.4 What do people care about? 5.2.5 Comparisons across preferences 5.3 Making use of happiness data 5.3.1 Proposed indicators 5.3.2 Putting a[currency]ects in their place 5.3.3 Identi?cation problems 5.3.4 Can happiness data be improved? 5.4 Conclusion 6 Empowering capabilities 6.1 The capability approach 6.1.1 From basic needs to capabilities 6.1.2 Functionings, between 'opulence' and 'utility' 6.1.3 From functionings to capabilities 6.2 Capabilities as opportunities 6.2.1 Valuing sets 6.2.2 The relevant aspects of opportunities 6.2.3 Shaping opportunity sets 6.2.4 Equality against set valuation 6.2.5 Why capabilities? 6.3 The valuation issue 6.3.1 The intersection approach 6.3.2 Disagreement and respect for diversity 6.3.3 Implications of respect for personal preferences 6.4 Is the CA a separate approach? Conclusion: How to converge on a multiplicity Why synthetic indicators? Shortcuts and pitfalls Vices and virtues of monetary indicators A multiplicity of synthetic indicators Sustainability warnings A A theory of the reference for equivalent incomes A.1 The model A.2 Reference operators A.3 Non-market goods A.4 Market prices A.5 The household problem B Proofs 233 B.1 A Paretian rank-dependent criterion B.2 Reference-price independence B.3 A simple proof of Arrow's theorem in an economic framework vi CONTENTS Bibliography

Rethinking "Generation Me": A Study of Cohort Effects From 1976-2006.

Abstract: Social commentators have argued that changes over the last decades have coalesced to create a relatively unique generation of young people. However, using large samples of U.S. high-school seniors from 1976 to 2006 (Total N = 477,380), we found little evidence of meaningful change in egotism, self-enhancement, individualism, self-esteem, locus of control, hopelessness, happiness, life satisfaction, loneliness, antisocial behavior, time spent working or watching television, political activity, the importance of religion, and the importance of social status over the last 30 years. Today's youth are less fearful of social problems than previous generations and they are also more cynical and less trusting. In addition, today's youth have higher educational expectations than previous generations. However, an inspection of effect sizes provided little evidence for strong or widespread cohort-linked changes.