1. Happiness, Subjective Well-Being and Positive Affect
Louise Cooper, Lynne Doran,
Derek Laffan & Sarah McSweeney.

2. Learning Outcomes
Understand definitions of Happiness, Subjective Well-Being (SWB) & Positive Affect
Understand theories of Happiness
Be aware of the measures available for Happiness, SWB & Positive Affect
Identify factors that influence happiness
Be aware of global happiness
Be aware of “happiness boosting” interventions and be able to apply it into your everyday life

3. Activity: What is Happiness?
Brainstorm

4. Subjective Well-Being
How people evaluate their own lives in terms of cognitive (life-satisfaction) and affective explanations (Boniwell, 2008)
Various positive emotions, feelings and moods that we frequently experience and easily recognise (Boniwell, 2008)
Positive Affect
Happiness

5. Video Sonja Lyubomirsky – What is Happiness?

6. Three routes to happiness Seligman (2002)
The Pleasant Life
Having many pleasures in life and the skills to amplify them
The Good Life
Knowing your signature strengths, and recreating your life (work, love, friendship, leisure, parenting) to use those strengths to have more ‘flow’ in life
The Meaningful Life
Using your signature strengths to serve something that you believe is larger than you are
There are three very different routes to happiness. First the Pleasant Life, consisting in having as many pleasures as possible and having the skills to amplify the pleasures. This is, of course, the only true kind of happiness on the Hollywood view. Second, the Good Life, which consists in knowing what your signature strengths are, and then recrafting your work, love, friendship, leisure and parenting to use those strengths to have more flow in life. Third, the Meaningful Life, which consists of using your signature strengths in the service of something that you believe is larger than you are.
Good and meaningful life fall into the umbrella of eudaimonia. Research shows that high levels of positive affect are long term with a eudaimonic route to happiness, versus, short-term with a hedonic route to happiness (Heffernon & Boniwell, 2011).

7. Set-Point Model

8. Adaptation Theory Strong reaction to recent events
High levels of happiness after winning the lotto
Returns to set-point (3 months)
Linked to ‘zero-sum’ theory
Happy and unhappy periods are cyclical
Brickman et al. (1978). Longitudinal study on “happiness among lotto winners”
Hedonic Adaption Prevention Model
Zero-sum theory suggests that happy periods in our life are followed inevitably followed by negative periods, which cancel each other out, therefore, any attempt to increase happiness will be unsuccessful.
Brickman et al. (1978). Longitudinal study on “happiness among lotto winners” who were interviewed on basic demographic variables and questions about how their life had changed since winning. The lotto winners related their everyday events as less pleasurable that the control groups and were no happier than they were before winning. The lotto winners also scored the same as paraplegics and quadriplegics on happiness levels. This experiment supports the theory of hedonic adaptations, bad or good, we have a natural set-point that will inevitably return to.
HAP Model is a proposed anicdote to adapatation is variety, Therefore, individuals must continually change their approach and happiness interventions in order to counteract any adaption mechanisms (Tzach & Luybomirski, 2006)

10. Discrepancy Theories
Increase in wealth in the last 50 years but happiness levels have stayed the same, why?
SWB is a function of comparison processes
Social, past-self, internalised standards
Status anxiety & Materialism
Linked with lower SWB and depression
Too much Choice
Satisficers V Maximisers
As we interact with others, we compare ourselves to them on many levels. Social comparison is when we compare our situation, attractiveness and wealth to others in either an upward or downward spiral. We tend to interact with people who make us feel good about ourselves and not bad about ourselves. Personality can affect whether we use upward or downward social comparisons and how we use it.
Would you rather earn €50,000 a year while others make €25,000, or, €100,000 a year while others make €250,000?
Status anxiety is linked to lower SWB and depression. Placing importance on money negatively correlates with life satisfaction, whereas, placing importance on love positively correlates with life satisfaction (Diener & Oishi, 2000, in Heffernon & Boniwell, 2011). However, there is an argument that materialism is only bad for you if it is not within your means which causes strain on an individual. Those who report high materialism along with high income report high well-being (Crawford et al., 2001, in Heffernon & Boniwell, 2011).
Finally, too much choice leads to problems for consumers in western society. Information problems, error problems, psychological problems.
Satisficers V Maximisers.

11. Global Measures of Happiness
Subjective Happiness Scale (Lyubomirsky & Lepper, 1999)
Satisfaction with Life Scale (Diener et al., 1985)
PANAS Questionnaire (Watson et al., 1985)
Meaning of Life Questionnaire (Steger et al., 2006)
Flow Experience Scale (Csikszentmihalyi & Csikszentmihalyi, 1988)

12. Global Measures of SWB Strengths Weaknesses Psychometrically sound
Valid
Reliable
Efficient
Cost effective
Kurtz, J. L., & Lyubomirsky, S. (in press).
Requires accurate reflection and unbiased assessment of one’s happiness
Influence of immediate circumstances
Sensitive to information accessed before measurement
Social comparisons
Strack et al., (1988) found no correlation between life satisfaction and dating satisfaction when a question about life satisfaction preceded a question about dating status (e.g., single vs. in a
relationship). However, when the question order was reversed, a significant positive correlation emerged. When respondents’ dating status was made accessible, they appeared to use it as a heuristic (or shortcut) to help judge their overall life satisfaction.
Social comparisons – even relatively arbitrary ones – can push global SWB ratings in one direction or another, depending on whether the comparison is favorable or unfavorable. For example, encountering an
experimenter in a wheelchair creates a downward social comparison that leads to inflated SWB ratings (Strack et al., 1990).

13. Experience Sampling Method (ESM)
More suitable (than global measures) for assessing the affective component
frequent positive affect and infrequent negative affect
Aggregate of momentary affective experiences encountered throughout daily life
Comes from Csikszentmihalyi’s work on ‘flow’
Costly & requires a great deal of participants’ time and co-operation
Stemmed from the work of Csikszentmihalyi’s (1990) work on flow. He was interested in when people experience flow in their everyday lives, outside of the lab, he needed an ecologically valid methodology that allowed for sampling participants throughout the course of the day – while they were at school, work, or at leisure to find out how they felt during these different episodes – as an alternative to retrospective reporting methods, such as interviews and questionnaires.
Csikszentmihalyi and colleagues gave participants pagers to carry everywhere throughout the day. The pagers were programmed to signal the participants randomly, with each signal serving as a prompt to immediately report their thoughts and feelings using a booklet of paper-and-pencil self-report forms.
Ref: Kurtz, J. L., & Lyubomirsky, S. (in press)

14. Day Reconstruction Method (DSM)
Proposed by Kahneman et al., (2004)
Short-term daily diary of distinct episodes
Appropriate for large scale data collections of SWB indicators
More cost-effective than ESM, but also requires a lot of participants’ time
Provides unique and novel information about what people do and how they feel in their everyday lives
Kahneman, Krueger, Schkade, Schwarz, and Stone (2004) proposed a type of short-term daily diary called the day reconstruction method (DRM) as an alternative to ESM. Using a diary format, participants using DRM are required to generate a detailed account of an entire day, broken down into distinct episodes. Instructions are: “Think of the episodes of your day. An episode can begin or end when you move to a different location, change activities, or change the people you are with” (Kahneman et al., 2004, p. 1777). E.g. “trip to grocery store,” “lunch with a friend”, as well as a brief description of where the participant was during the episode, what he or she was doing, and with whom.
Then, the episode is rated using a variety of adjectives (e.g., happy, competent, interested, tense, tired) on scales ranging from 0 (not at all) to 6 (very strongly). Findings coming out of this paradigm include a study of 909
working women that revealed that time spent in intimate relations, socializing, relaxing, praying or meditating, and eating were among the most enjoyable, whereas commuting, working, and childcare were among the least enjoyable (Kahneman et al., 2004; Krueger et al., 2009).
Mounting evidence suggests that real-time measures (ESM & DSM), contribute unique and novel information about what people do and how they feel in their everyday lives. As work on happiness becomes integrated with national indicators of the quality of life (Diener, Kesebir, & Lucas, 2008), as positive psychological science becomes increasingly popularized, and – perhaps most important - as technology becomes increasingly accessible, these types of measures will arguably become much more common.
Ref: Kurtz, J. L., & Lyubomirsky, S. (in press)

15. Who is happy?
It appears that most of us are indeed happy (Myers, 2000).
Five ways to wellbeing – two recent studies, The Foresight Report and Gallup’s most recent world poll, have shown similar finding. The findings suggest that there are five necessary elements for wellbeing
Majority of people score in the ‘somewhat satisfied set point’, there fore the majority of the time we view stimuli and circumstances as positive.

16. The Foresight report Connect (relationships) Be active Take notice
“stop to smell the roses”
Keep learning
Give (random acts of kindness)
Conducted by the New Economics Foundation (NEF)
Reviews already completed pieces of research on ways to wellbeing.
The five ways to well being included….
Connect - when we build relationships with the people around us, we experience greater levels of wellbeing.
Be active – taking care of our bodies as well as our mind is a very important factor to wellbeing.
Take notice - research has shown that, “stopping to smell the roses” can increase wellbeing.
Keep learning – challenging ourselves to learn can enhance our wellbeing.
Give - levels of wellbeing can also be enhances by taking part in random acts of kindness.

17. The Gallup organisation
Career wellbeing
Social wellbeing
Financial wellbeing
Physical wellbeing
Community wellbeing
Career wellbeing – where you spend most of your time during the day
Social wellbeing – relationships and experiences of love
Financial wellbeing – how well you manage your financial situations
Physical wellbeing – ability to have good health and energy
Community wellbeing – role and participation within your community
Gallups most recent world poll of 150+ countries
66% are doing well in at least one of the areas, whereas only 7% are doing well in all five.
The five elements are all things that are within a persons control.

18. Activity: What makes us happy? True or False
Marriage
Children
Age
Income
Gender
Education
Religion
True
False

19. Income and Happiness Does money make us happy? YES…well a little bit.
Individuals who live in countries with high GDP, such as the USA, on average score higher on wellbeing measures than those living in countries with low GDP, such as Togo (Deaton, 2008)

20. Income and Happiness
In order to maintain balanced levels of wellbeing, individuals must take home approximately $5000 per month, anything more will do little to enhance happiness.
An extra $10,000 per annum will only bump up your happiness levels by approximately 2 per cent (Christakis & Fowler, 2009).

21. Relationships and Happiness
Being around others enhances individual wellbeing.
Spending time in social settings enhances levels of wellbeing among both introverted or extroverted, (Froh et al., 2007).
Happier people are more likely to get married, while reporting a happy marriage as they stay together.

22. Relationships and Happiness
The relationship between children and marital satisfaction shows high levels of life satisfaction at marriage, and then drops at the birth of the first child
The levels of life satisfaction also continue to drop throughout childhood and adolescence, then returns to high levels when the children leave the home
Therefore, having children actually decreases levels of SWB (Heffernon & Boniwell, 2011)

23. Work and Happiness
An individual’s job perception can influence wellbeing
One third of employee’s perceive work as a ‘calling orientation’
Job orientation
Career orientation
Calling orientation
Job orientation: job = money, not important to overall life.
Career orientation: building a career and progressing forward.
Calling orientation: workers are immersed healthily in what they do (could relate this to the good and meaningful life, incorporating “flow” which makes us happier)

24. Health and Happiness
Diener and Biswas-Diener (2008) have categorised the effects of SWB on physical health into 3 groups;
The likelihood a person will contract a specific illness
How long the person will live after contracting a life threatening illness
How long a persons lifespan is
Emotional Style and the Susceptibility to the Common Cold. Psychosomatic Medicine, 65(4):652-7

25. Religion and Happiness
Religious people have reported having slightly higher levels of SWB than those who do not
E.g. Belief in something higher, spirituality, afterlife

26. Other Factors and Happiness
Age
Gender
Education
High levels of SWB were found in those with higher educational status
Elderly people are as happy as younger people
No significant difference of happiness levels between men and women has been found
People scoring high on wellbeing were found to have a higher educational status than those who scored lower on the scales

27. Take a break. Have a.....

28. Global Happiness
Evidence indicates that SWB levels of given countries are stable (Inglehart & Klingemann, 2000)
Social comparison theory
gains and losses of different individuals in a nation result in no noticeable shifts in happiness levels for the society as a whole
The SWB and happiness of Americans has been examined since 1946 (Inglehart, Foa, Peterson & Welzel, 2008)
Social comparison theory suggests that the gains and losses of different individuals in a nation will cancel each other out, resulting in no noticeable shifts in happiness levels for the society as a whole
No other country has a comparable database, and the US data shows a flat trend from 1946 to the present (Inglehart, Foa, Peterson and Welzel, 2008)

29. Global happiness
Inglehart et al. (2008) found that a sense of control over your life is conducive to happiness
Democratic countries generally report higher happiness levels
Happy people are more likely to successfully sustain a democracy
Inglehart and Klingemann (2000) found that any country that has experienced Communist rule tends to show relatively lower levels of SWB.
Even when compared to countries who are a much lower economic level.

30. Activity: Happiest Countries

31. Answers for Activity
Activity 1 Costa Rica 1 Denmark 2 Mexico 8 Russia 73 India 115 China 125
Activity 2
A) Costa Rica
B) Denmark
C) Russia
D) China
It has been suggested that Latin American countries such as Mexico and Costa Rica may be happier due to their cultural emphasis on family

32. Happiest Places on Earth
Country Score
Costa Rica
Denmark
Puerto Rico
Iceland
Switzerland
Canada
Finland
Mexico
Norway
Sweden
(World Database of Happiness, 2010)
Depending on which poll you look at you will see different countries being listed as being happier – however, either Denmark or Costa Rica are consistently ranked as happiest. For the purpose of this presentation I chose to look at the World Database of happiness as it seemed most relevant to us, other polls look at environmental factors and life expectancy

34. Why is Denmark so Happy?
For past 30 years research has consistently shown that Danes tend to be happier (Inglehart & Klingleman, 2000)
Welfare state
High tax rates
people could pay between and 70% tax
Social equality
50 -60% of the population consistently rank themselves as being very satisfied with their life
However, this means that people don’t chose careers depending on how much money they earn – women highly respected in business and achieve equal pay
state provides universal tax-funded childcare, parental leave, health care, education (including university), retirement pensions and sick leave. If you lose your job the government continues to pay up to 90% of your salary for 4 years. Get paid to go to college between $400 and $500.
People rarely have to take drastic action such as taking out quick loans therefore tend to have lower debt
Population are very environmentally conscious – one third cycle bikes

35. Gross National Happiness
Gross National Happiness (GNH) is an alternative to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) as a means of measuring progress within a country
Increased wealth isn’t always an indicator of happiness or progress
An example of how positive psychology is being implemented to help people around the world – not just viewed as pop psychology anymore being taken seriously..

36. Well-being and Global Policies
In 2009 Nicholas Sarkozy called on nations around the world to stop using GDP as a measure of progress and instead to begin looking at measures of well-being. He said our reliance on GDP may have contributed to the financial crisis
In July 2011, the United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution about happiness. They declared it should have a greater role in development policies.
Given the strong relationship between the freedom of a nation and the happiness of its citizens (Inglehart, Foa, Peterson, & Weizel, 2008), the UN resolution on happiness may be more revolutionary than intended, because an obvious way to bolster happiness is to encourage freedom, locally and globally.
The resolution said “the pursuit of happiness is a fundamental human goal” and embodies the spirit of the globally agreed targets known as the Millennium Development Goals

37. Set Point Theory Brickman et al. (1978) Lykken and Tellegen (1996)
Lottery study: return to normal level of happiness was attributed to habituation and contrast effects however could be an example of the set-point theory
) found that after a year lottery winners reported happiness levels returned to the same level as the control group.
examined happiness amongst twins and found that genetic factors were a far greater indicator of happiness than education, socio-economic status, religion or marital status.

38. Set Point Theory
Fujita and Diener (2005) found that there is a modest stability in life satisfaction but that around quarter of the population’s life satisfaction does change significantly
A major flaw of the studies investigating the set point theory was that they were all carried out within a single country
There are huge variations in happiness levels between countries so unless we assume that there is some difference in basic genetic structures we have to conclude that genetics are not entirely responsible for happiness

39. Situational Factors
People’s circumstances account for only 10% of their happiness levels
Situational factors refer to one time changes that usually occur independently of effort and engagement (Sheldon & Lyubomirsky, 2006)
a person’s education level, the country they live in and marriage

40. Intentional Activity
Intentional activity (IA) involves continual effort and engagement in some intentional process (Sheldon & Lyubomirsky, 2006)
essentially this is what we do everyday
Accounts for 40% of our happiness
IA allows for increases in happiness above the levels set out by our circumstances and set point
i.e., it is the only aspect of our happiness within our control

41. Intentional Activity
Lyubomirsky, Sheldon and Schkade (2005) suggest that when choosing activities we should:
Find activities that fit our needs and personalities
They should vary, i.e., changing your exercise routine
Timing of activities should vary
Link: since only aspect of happiness within our control it is important that we chose our activities careful to maximise our happiness.

42. Increasing Your Happiness
Happiness Boosting
Increasing Your Happiness

43. Happiness Boosting Activity
In Your Groups
You will be assigned an Intervention and administered the Subjective Happiness Scale (Lyubomirsky & Lepper, 1999)
Score it and bring results to the top

44. Happiness Interventions
Up until now, the focus has been on what exactly happiness is and the kinds of things that make us happy.
Now, the focus is on how to INCREASE happiness or in other words; “Happiness Boosting”.

45. Happiness Boosting
Happiness “Boosting” usually happens in the form of interventions
Happiness Boosting interventions are important for two reasons:
to make people generally happier and,
to allow happy people to develop other positive characteristics
(Snyder & Lopez, 2005)

46. Past Happiness Interventions
Fordyce (1977)
Found that people tend to become happier when they mimic the positive characteristics of people they perceive are happier than them
Link to discrepancy theory as Louise outlined

47. Past Happiness Interventions
Seligman, Reivich, Jaycox & Gillham (1995)
Found that children who were at risk of developing depressive and mood disorders were significantly less depressed after training in optimistic thinking and problem solving

48. Recent Happiness Interventions
Lyubomirsky (2007)
The How of Happiness: A
Practical Guide to Getting
the Life You Want

49. 12 Happiness Activities: Lyubomirsky (2007)
Expressing Gratitude
Cultivating Optimism
Avoiding Overthinking and Social Comparison
Practicing Acts of Kindness
Nurturing Social Relationships
Developing Strategies for Coping
Learning to Forgive
Increasing “Flow” Experiences
Savoring Life’s Joys
Committing to your Goals
Practicing Religion and Spirituality
Taking Care of your Body (Meditation/ Acting like a Happy Person)

50. Recent Happiness Interventions
Live Happy iPhone application (Signal Patterns & Lyubomirsky, 2008)
Designed based on positive psychological research findings in the area of happiness boosting ™

51. Live Happy™ and Signal Patterns

52. Recent Happiness Interventions
Walls (2010) launched a marketing campaign about sharing to the world the link of ice cream and happiness

53. Ice Cream and Happiness

54. Van Oudenhove et al. (2011)
12 healthy, non-obese volunteers had their brains scanned using FMRI
Each had a gastric feeding tube positioned
Listened to pieces of sad or neutral classical music while they viewed images of human facial expressions depicting either sad or neutral emotion

55. Van Oudenhove et al. (2011)
The brain's responses to sadness were significantly reduced when the fatty solution was infused into the stomach
Respondents also reported less hunger and a better mood when the fatty solution was given

56. Discussion Think, Pair, Share
. What did you find most interesting/important while learning about happiness?
Write down one or two points
Discuss with the person beside you
Share with the class

57. Questions to Think About
What is happiness, SWB & Positive Affect?
Can happiness be measured? Give examples.
Is happiness signified by an individual’s global evaluation of his or her life, or is it the aggregate of many moments, as measured by ESM?
What factors influence happiness?
Can happiness be acquired?
What happiness interventions are available?

58. Further Reading Articles Books
Cohen et al. (2003). Emotional Style and the Susceptibility to the Common Cold. Psychosomatic Medicine, 65(4):652-7
Books
Heffron, K. and Boniwell, I. (2011). Happiness and Subjective Wellbeing across Nations. In: Positive Psychology Theory, Research and Applications. p
Websites

59. References
Boniwell, I. (2008). Positive psychology in a nutshell (2nd Ed). London: PWBC. Brickman, P., Coates, D., & Janoff-Bulman, R. (1978). Lottery winners and accident victims: Is happiness relative? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 36, Diener, E. and Biswas-Diener, R. (2008) Happiness: Unlocking the Mysteries of Psychological Wealth. Boston, MA:Blackwell Publishing. Fordyce, M.W. (1977). Development of a program to increase personal happiness. Journal of Counselling Psychology, 24, Fujita, F., & Diener, E. (2005). Life satisfaction set point: Stability and change. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 88, Heffron, K, and Boniwell, I. "Happiness and Subjective Wellbeing Across Nations." Positive psychology: Theory, Research and Applications. Buckingham: Open University Press, Inglehart, R. and Klingemann, H-D. (2000) ‘Genes, culture, democracy and happiness’, in Diener and Suh (2000). Inglehart, R., Foa, R., Peterson, C., & Welzel, C. (2008). Development, freedom and rising happiness. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 3, Kristoff, N. D. (2010). The happiest people. The New York Times. Retrieved fromhttp:// Kurtz, J. L., & Lyubomirsky, S. (in press). Positive psychology. In M. R. Mehl & T. S. (Eds.), Handbook of research methods for studying daily life. New York: Guilford Press.

60. References
Lykken,D. & Tellegen, A. (1996). Happiness is a stochastic phenomena. Journal of Psychological Sciences, 7,
Lyubomirsky, S. (2007). The How of Happiness: A Scientific Approach to Getting the Life You Want. New York: Penguin Press.
Lyubomirsky, S., Sheldon, K. M., & Schkade, D. (2005). Pursuing happiness: The architecture of sustainable change. Review of General Psychology, 9,
Seligman, M.E.P., Reivich, K., Jaycox, L., and Gillham, J. (1995). The Optimistic Child. New York: Houghton Mifflin.
Seligman, M. E. (2006). Pleasure, Meaning & Eudaimonia. Retrieved from
Sheldon, K. M., & Lyubomirsky, S. (2006). Achieving sustainable gains in happiness: Change your actions, not your circumstances. Journal of Happiness Studies, 7, 55–86.
Signal Patterns and Lyubomirsky, S. (2008). Live Happy. Pleasantville, NY.
Snyder, C.R., & Lopez, S. J. (2002). Handbook of Positive Psychology (Eds).  New York: Oxford University Press.
Unilever. (2010). Ice cream served with a smile. Retrieved from
Van Oudenhove, L., McKie, S., Lassman, D., Uddin, B., Paine, P., Coen, S., Gregory, L., Tack, J. and Aziz, Q. (2011). Fatty acid–induced gut-brain signalling attenuates neural and behavioral effects of sad emotion in humans. Journal of Clinical Investigation, 121(8),
White, A. (2007). A global projection of subjective well-being: A challenge to positive psychology? Psychtalk :56,

61. Thank you for listening!