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Objective/Background Method Results Conclusions Conservative ideology, broadly speaking, has been widely linked to greater happiness and meaning in life. Is that true of all forms of a good life? We examined whether a psychologically rich life is associated with political orientation, system justification, and Protestant work ethic, independent of two other traditional forms of a good life: a happy life and a meaningful life.Participants completed a questionnaire that assessed conservative worldviews and three aspects of well‐being (N = 583 in Study 1; N = 348 in Study 2; N = 436 in Study 3; N = 1,217 in Study 4; N = 2,176 in Study 5; N = 516 in Study 6).Happiness was associated with political conservatism and system justification, and meaning in life was associated with Protestant work ethic. In contrast, zero‐order correlations showed that psychological richness was not associated with conservative worldviews. However, when happiness and meaning in life were included in multiple regression models, the nature of the association shifted: Psychological richness was consistently inversely associated with system justification and on average less political conservatism, suggesting that happiness and meaning in life were suppressor variables.These findings suggest that happiness and meaning in life are associated with conservative ideology, whereas psychological richness is not. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We explored in three cultures (the United States, Korea, and Costa Rica) the association between subjective well-being (SWB) and behaviors often described as positive or beneficial. In two studies we found that three forms of subjective well-being (positive affect, negative affect, and life satisfaction) were associated with several categories of behavior (health behavior, supportive behavior, citizenship behavior, and creative behavior). Most of the associations were significant in three nations and not significantly different between nations. Furthermore, we examined whether there exists a significant association between common variance across types of SWB and common variance of categories of behaviors. We found that there was a significant common pathway between a latent SWB factor and a latent behavior factor, along with unique associations between individual SWB and behavior categories. We conclude that the SWB and behavior associations are widespread across the three distinct cultures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study tests two competing theoretical perspectives on the relationship between personal values and global life satisfaction, and the mediation of life domain satisfaction, contributing with novel empirical data across three countries and continents: United States (N = 497), North America; Mozambique (N = 544), Africa; and Portugal (N = 541), Europe. Structural equation modelling showed that personal values and life domain satisfaction associated in both ways differently and similarly with global life satisfaction across countries. Global life satisfaction significantly associated with benevolence in the three samples; with stimulation in the U.S. and Mozambique, but not in Portugal; with tradition in Mozambique and Portugal, but not in the US; and with achievement only in Portugal. The two theoretical perspectives received partial support from the data, suggesting that each may explain part of the phenomena. Life domain satisfaction mediated the relationship between personal values and global life satisfaction. However, the person-environment congruency values perspective received the most support from the data, showing that personal values differ in how they predict global life satisfaction across samples. The differences found suggest a possible connection with individualism-collectivism and the developmental level in each country, but also with other dominant cultural values such as uncertainty avoidance and indulgence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From ancient time, Homo sapiens moved around in search of a better life. Although the development of agriculture and industrialization no longer necessitates frequently moving to find new food sources, people today still change their residences for a variety of reasons. This article highlights key findings from residential mobility, focusing on its implications for the self, social relationships, societies, and well-being. Generally, residential mobility shifts individual attention away from collective attributes toward personal attributes. It also changes people's relationship styles and preferences, leading individuals to favor wider social networks, more open communication, low-commitment groups, and egalitarian helpers. In addition, it increases tolerance for norm violations and moral deviations. Lastly, residential mobility can explain some cross-national and within-nation variations. This article reviews recent psychological research on residential mobility and then discusses limitations, paradoxical findings, and future directions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Psychological science has typically conceptualized a good life in terms of either hedonic or eudaimonic well-being. We propose that psychological richness is another, neglected aspect of what people consider a good life. Unlike happy or meaningful lives, psychologically rich lives are best characterized by a variety of interesting and perspective-changing experiences. We present empirical evidence that happiness, meaning, and psychological richness are related but distinct and desirable aspects of a good life, with unique causes and correlates. In doing so, we show that a nontrivial number of people around the world report they would choose a psychologically rich life at the expense of a happy or meaningful life, and that approximately a third say that undoing their life's biggest regret would have made their lives psychologically richer. Furthermore, we propose that the predictors of a psychologically rich life are different from those of a happy life or a meaningful life, and report evidence suggesting that people leading psychologically rich lives tend to be more curious, think more holistically, and lean more politically liberal. Together, this work moves us beyond the dichotomy of hedonic versus eudaimonic well-being, and lays the foundation for the study of psychological richness as another dimension of a good life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Psychologists typically conceptualize a good life either in terms of hedonic (e.g. life satisfaction, positive affect) or eudaimonic well-being (e.g. meaning, fulfillment of potential). In the current research, we explored another form of a good life: the psychologically rich life. In Study 1, we conducted a 14-day daily diary study (N = 203). In Study 2, we compared Chinese studying in the United States (N = 97) with Chinese studying in China (N = 169). In Study 3, we conducted a 12-week weekly survey study among Americans studying abroad (N = 43) and Americans studying in the United States (N = 100). In Study 4, we recruited students who had studied abroad (N = 84) and their friends (informants) who did not (N = 76). Study 1 showed that participants who scored higher in a psychologically rich life were more likely to take a short trip during the 14-day period. In Studies 2 to 4, those who studied abroad reported higher levels of a psychologically rich life than those who did not. Unusual experiences such as study abroad were consistently associated with higher levels of psychological richness, whereas they were not consistently associated with life satisfaction, positive affect, and meaning in life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the association between individualism and satisfaction in societies is well documented, the precise mechanism linking these two remained understudied so far. Here we coin and describe the specific facet of individualism responsible for the above association–the 'open society'. Open societies foster four others-benefitting attitudes: tolerance, trust, civic engagement, and minimization of materialistic pressure. In the others-benefitting qualities of these four attitudes, this paper finds the mechanism promoting life satisfaction of societies. Further, when open society attitudes are controlled for, the most common facet of individualism (quantified by Hofstede) turns out to be a negative predictor of satisfaction in societies. At the individual level of analysis, the relation of endorsement of four open society attitudes with individual life satisfaction is almost absent. Thus, open society promotes the satisfaction of communities in a eusocial way only. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study examined cultural differences in the act of sharing positive events with others, called capitalization attempts. The first three studies tested whether capitalization attempts differ between two cultures using multiple methods: self-reports (Study 1), children's storybooks (Study 2), and Facebook (Study 3). We found that Koreans are less likely to share their positive events with others than European Americans. Study 4 further examined the antecedents and consequences of capitalization attempts. We replicated the earlier findings that Koreans are hesitant to share their positive events and demonstrated that this is because Koreans are more concerned about the potential negative consequences for social relationships. Moreover, we found that the cultural differences in capitalization attempts partly account for mean-level differences in well-being between cultures. Implications for capitalization, culture, and well-being are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Does a major natural disaster change human values and job preferences? The present studies examined whether the experience of a natural disaster experience shifts people's values and job preferences toward pro-social directions. In Study 1 (cross-temporal analysis), we analysed job application data in nine cities in Japan over 12 years and found that the popularity of pro-social occupations (e.g. firefighter) increased after the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake in 1995, in particular the area hit hardest by the quake. In Study 2 (a large national survey), we found that Japanese respondents who had experienced a major earthquake are more likely to hold a pro-social job than those who never experienced a major earthquake. Together, the current findings suggest that the experience of a major natural disaster shifts human values from the egocentric to the allocentric direction, which in turn could result in a social structure that values pro-social occupations. Copyright © 2017 European Association of Personality Psychology [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Happiness and well-being are often defined as internal feelings or states of satisfaction. As such, research on well-being has focused on the long-term happiness and life satisfaction of individuals. But recently, psychological researchers have also begun to examine the effects that group-level functions (e.g., nation-level economic status) have on happiness. The present article: (a) overviews measures of individual and collective happiness and the validity of these measurements; (b) explicates the role of culture in understanding the long-term happiness and life satisfaction of individuals; and (c) explores the possibility and importance of studying the happiness of collectives (e.g., work groups, organizations, cities, nations). We then discuss future directions for happiness research, proposing several methodological and theoretical areas for progress in: (a) cross-temporal analyses to examine historical changes; and (b) multilevel analyses to identify the units of culture that affect happiness. Additionally, this paper argues that policy-making and interdisciplinary approaches can make important contributions to happiness studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evidence shows that people feel mild positive moods when no strong emotional events are occurring, a phenomenon known as positive mood offset. We offer an evolutionary explanation of this characteristic, showing that it improves fertility, fecundity, and health, and abets other characteristics that were critical to reproductive success. We review research showing that positive mood offset is virtually universal in the nations of the world, even among people who live in extremely difficult circumstances. Positive moods increase the likelihood of the types of adaptive behaviors that likely characterized our Paleolithic ancestors, such as creativity, planning, mating, and sociality. Because of the ubiquity and apparent advantages of positive moods, it is a reasonable hypothesis that humans were selected for positivity offset in our evolutionary past. We outline additional evidence that is needed to help confirm that positive mood offset is an evolutionary adaptation in humans and we explore the research questions that the hypothesis generates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights: [•] Report a cross-cultural study on maximizing and subjective well-being. [•] Use a nationally representative sample from Japan and the US. [•] Use two different maximizing scales. [•] Maximizing was consistently negatively associated with subjective well-being among Japanese. [•] Maximizing was negatively associated with SWB, only with Schwartz et al.’s (2002) scale in the US. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Using Gallup World Poll data, we examined the role of societal wealth for meaning in life across 132 nations. Although life satisfaction was substantially higher in wealthy nations than in poor nations, meaning in life was higher in poor nations than in wealthy nations. In part, meaning in life was higher in poor nations because people in those nations were more religious. The mediating role of religiosity remained significant after we controlled for potential third variables, such as education, fertility rate, and individualism. As Frankl (1963) stated in Man’s Search for Meaning, it appears that meaning can be attained even under objectively dire living conditions, and religiosity plays an important role in this search. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In the two studies reported here, we examined the relation among residential mobility, economic conditions, and optimal social-networking strategy. In Study 1, a computer simulation showed that regardless of economic conditions, having a broad social network with weak friendship ties is advantageous when friends are likely to move away. By contrast, having a small social network with deep friendship ties is advantageous when the economy is unstable but friends are not likely to move away. In Study 2, we examined the validity of the computer simulation using a sample of American adults. Results were consistent with the simulation: American adults living in a zip code where people are residentially stable but economically challenged were happier if they had a narrow but deep social network, whereas in other socioeconomic conditions, people were generally happier if they had a broad but shallow networking strategy. Together, our studies demonstrate that the optimal social-networking strategy varies as a function of socioeconomic conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Using data from the Gallup World Poll, we examined whether progressive taxation is associated with increased levels of subjective well-being. Consistent with Rawls’s theory of justice, our results showed that progressive taxation was positively associated with the subjective well-being of nations. However, the overall tax rate and government spending were not associated with the subjective well-being of nations. Furthermore, controlling for the wealth of nations and income inequality, we found that respondents living in a nation with more-progressive taxation evaluated their lives as closer to the best possible life and reported having more positive and less negative daily experiences than did respondents living in a nation with less-progressive taxation. Finally, we found that the association between more-progressive taxation and higher levels of subjective well-being was mediated by citizens’ satisfaction with public goods, such as education and public transportation. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The present study examined life stage and cultural differences in the degree to which familiarity of one's physical location and interaction partner is associated with daily well-being. Participants reported all the activities they engaged in and how they felt during these activities on a previous day using the Day Reconstruction Method (Kahneman, Krueger, Schkade, Schwarz, & Stone, 2004). Both Korean and American retirees were happier when in a familiar place than in an unfamiliar place, whereas the reverse was true for both Korean and American working adults. In addition, we found cultural differences in the role of familiarity of the interaction partner. Specifically, Koreans (both retirees and working adults) were substantially happier when they interacted with a familiar person than when they interacted with an unfamiliar person. In contrast, Americans (both retirees and working adults) were no happier with a familiar person than with an unfamiliar person. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using General Social Survey data from 1972 to 2008, we found that Americans were on average happier in the years with less national income inequality than in the years with more national income inequality. We further demonstrated that this inverse relation between income inequality and happiness was explained by perceived fairness and general trust. That is, Americans trusted other people less and perceived other people to be less fair in the years with more national income inequality than in the years with less national income inequality. The negative association between income inequality and happiness held for lower-income respondents, but not for higher-income respondents. Most important, we found that the negative link between income inequality and the happiness of lower-income respondents was explained not by lower household income, but by perceived unfairness and lack of trust. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Results from two studies revealed that the relation between meaning in life and life satisfaction was moderated by the extent to which the rater was searching for meaning in his or her life. In Studies 1a and 1b, the presence of meaning was more strongly related to life satisfaction for those who were actively searching for meaning in life than for those who were not. Study 2 extended the finding to judgments concerning a fictitious target's life satisfaction based on experimentally manipulated information regarding meaning in life. Thus, the role of meaning in life satisfaction judgments varies across individuals, depending on the level of search for meaning in life. These results suggest that search for meaning behaves like a schema increasing the salience of meaning-relevant information, and provides new ways of understanding people's efforts to establish meaningful lives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What is a good society? Philosophers from Plato to Bentham have argued that a good society is a happy society--namely, a society in which most citizens are happy and free from fear. Since the publication of The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith in 1776, most economists have implicitly assumed that a happy society is a materially wealthy society. Thus, gross national product and related indices became the most popular indicators of the well-being of nations from the 1950s to date. Recently, however, prominent economists as well as political scientists, sociologists, and psychologists have shown that a happy society is not only a materially wealthy society but also a society in which citizens can trust one another, have a sense of freedom, and have close social relationships. The inquiry into the psychological wealth of nations, or the subjective well-being of nations, helps answer a fundamental question in philosophy and social sciences for millennia: "What is a good society?" [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We tested the relation between residential mobility and well-being in a sample of 7,108 American adults who were followed for 10 years. The more residential moves participants had experienced as children, the lower the levels of well-being as adults. As predicted, however, the negative association between the number of residential moves and well-being was observed among introverts but not among extraverts. We further demonstrated that the negative association between residential mobility and well-being among introverts was explained by the relative lack of close social relationships. Finally, we found that introverts who had moved frequently as children were more likely to have died during the 10-year follow-up. Among extraverts, childhood residential mobility was unrelated to their mortality risk as adults. These findings indicate that residential moves can be a risk factor for introverts and that extraversion can be an interpersonal resource for social relationships and well-being in mobile societies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Residential mobility is an increasingly important personal and societal issue in both the United States and the world in general. However, it has received relatively limited attention in psychological theorizing and research. This article demonstrates the importance of residential mobility in understanding the self, social relationships, and well-being. Recent research has shown that residential mobility (number of moves for an individual or percentage having moved recently for a neighborhood) is associated with the primacy of the personal over the collective self. It is also associated with "duty-free" friendships and group memberships rather than obligatory friendships and group memberships. Overall, residential mobility is associated with lower levels of well-being at the individual level of analysis. Finally, residential mobility is associated with personal forms of subjective well-being (based on self-esteem, the verification of the personal self) as opposed to interpersonal forms of subjective well-being (based on social support, the verification of the collective selves). In short, residential mobility is a powerful, parsimonious explanatory construct in the self, social relationships, and subjective well-being and may be a key to understanding the future of mind and behavior in the increasingly mobile world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

East Asians and Asian Americans report lower levels of subjective well-being than Europeans and European Americans. Three studies found support for the hypothesis that such differences may be due to the psychological meanings Eastern and Western cultures attach to positive and negative affect. Study 1 demonstrated that the desire to repeat a recent vacation was significantly predicted by recalled positive affect—but not recalled negative affect—for European Americans, whereas Asian Americans considered both positive and negative affect. Study 2 replicated this effect in judging satisfaction with a personal friendship. Study 3 linked changes in European Americans' life satisfaction to everyday positive events caused by the self (vs. others) and changes in Japanese life satisfaction to everyday negative events caused by others (vs. the self). Positive affect appears particularly meaningful for European Americans and negative affect for Asian Americans and Japanese when judging a satisfying vacation, friendship, or life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Meaning in life is thought to be important to well-being throughout the human life span. We assessed the structure, levels, and correlates of the presence of meaning in life, and the search for meaning, within four life stage groups: emerging adulthood, young adulthood, middle-age adulthood, and older adulthood. Results from a sample of Internet users (N = 8756) demonstrated the structural invariance of the meaning measure used across life stages. Those at later life stages generally reported a greater presence of meaning in their lives, whereas those at earlier life stages reported higher levels of searching for meaning. Correlations revealed that the presence of meaning has similar relations to well-being across life stages, whereas searching for meaning is more strongly associated with well-being deficits at later life stages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 3 studies, the authors found support for the value-congruence model that accounts for cultural variations in memory for emotional experiences. In Study 1, the authors found that in the made-in-the-U.S. scenario condition, European Americans were more accurate than were Asian Americans in their retrospective frequency judgments of emotions. However, in the made-in-Japan scenario condition, European Americans were less accurate than were Asian Americans. In Study 2, the authors demonstrated that value orientation mediates the Culture X Type of Event congruence effect. In Study 3 (a daily event sampling study), the authors showed that the congruence effect was explained by the importance of parental approval. In sum, emotional events congruent with personal values remain in memory longer and influence retrospective frequency judgments of emotion more than do incongruent events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors conducted 3 studies to test a socioecological model of procommunity action. Study I showed that residents of stable communities purchased a "critical habitat" license plate to support preservation of the environment in their home state more often than did residents of mobile communities. Study 2 demonstrated that home game baseball attendance was less dependent on the team's record in stable cities than in mobile cities. Study 3, an experiment, showed that residential stability had a causal impact on procommunity behavior. Moreover, the effect of stability was partially mediated by identification with the "community." Together. these studies indicate that residential stability can lead to stronger identification with one's community, which, in turn, leads to more procommunity behaviors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors examined cultural and individual differences in the relation between dally events and daily satisfaction. In a preliminary study, they established cross-cultural equivalence of 50 daily events. In the main study, participants in the United States, Korea, and Japan completed daily surveys on the 50 events and daily satisfaction for 21 days. The multilevel random coefficient model analyses showed that (a) the within-person association between positive events and daily satisfaction was significantly stronger among Asian American, Korean, and Japanese participants than among European American participants and (b) the within-person association between positive events and daily satisfaction was significantly weaker among individuals high in global life satisfaction than among those low in global life satisfaction. The findings demonstrate a weaker effect of positive events on daily well-being among individuals and cultures high in global well-being. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This study tested the relevance of ten psychological needs in emotional well-being among older and younger adults in two cultures (the US and South Korea). Participants were asked to recall their “most satisfying event” for the past month, and then were asked to evaluate the relevance of ten psychological needs to that event. Results indicated that both age and cultural groups generally emphasized the importance of autonomy, competence, and relatedness, as proposed by self-determination Theory (Deci & Ryan, 1991). There were, however, some cultural variations. For Americans, self-esteem was the most important need for both young and old age groups. For Koreans, autonomy was the most salient need for young adults, whereas self-actualizing-meaning and popularity-influence were the most important needs for older adults. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In two studies, we examined the role of perceived fulfillment of parental expectations in the subjective well-being of college students. In Study 1, we found that American college students reported having higher levels of life satisfaction and self-esteem than did Japanese college students. American college students also reported having fulfilled parental expectations to a greater degree than did Japanese college students. Most importantly, the cultural difference in well-being was mediated by perceived fulfillment of parental expectations. In Study 2, we replicated the mediational finding with Asian American and European American college students. Asian American participants also perceived their parents' expectations about their academic performance to be more specific than did European Americans, which was associated with the cultural difference in perceived fulfillment of parental expectations. In short, perceived parental expectations play an important role in the cultural difference in the well-being of Asians and European Americans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors examined the influence of temporarily and chronically accessible information on life satisfaction judgments. Meta-analyses revealed high retest-reliability of life satisfaction judgments and weak effects of the item order of domain and global satisfaction judgments. Study 1 (N = 225) failed to replicate a widely cited finding of strong item-order effects. In Studies 2 (N = 100), 3 (N = 200), and 4 (N = 222), chronically accessible information was a strong predictor of life satisfaction judgments, whereas item order had a relatively small effect. Study 5 (N = 651) demonstrated that the results generalize to single item measures and judgments of shorter time periods. The results suggest that life satisfaction judgments are more heavily based on chronically accessible than temporarily accessible information. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduces a series of articles on culture and subjective well-being.

The authors examined the interplay of personality and cultural factors in the prediction of the affective (hedonic balance) and the cognitive (life satisfaction) components of subjective well-being (SWB). They predicted that the influence of personality on life satisfaction is mediated by hedonic balance and that the relation between hedonic balance and life satisfaction is moderated by culture. As a consequence, they predicted that the influence of personality on life satisfaction is also moderated by culture. Participants from 2 individualistic cultures (United States, Germany) and 3 collectivistic cultures (Japan, Mexico, Ghana) completed measures of Extraversion, Neuroticism, hedonic balance, and life satisfaction. As predicted, Extraversion and Neuroticism influenced hedonic balance to the same degree in all cultures, and hedonic balance was a stronger predictor of life satisfaction in individualistic than in collectivistic cultures. The influence of Extraversion and Neuroticism on life satisfaction was largely mediated by hedonic balance. The results suggest that the influence of personality on the emotional component of SWB is pancultural, whereas the influence of personality on the cognitive component of SWB is moderated by culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Three studies were conducted to examine the role of global life satisfaction in the discrepancy between specific and global domain satisfaction. Participants rated both global (e.g., education) and the corresponding, specific domain (e.g., professors, textbooks) satisfactions. In 3 studies, we found that individuals with higher life satisfaction evaluated global domain as a whole as more satisfying than those with lower life satisfaction, given the same level of satisfaction with specific domains. In Study 3, we also found that, given the same level of satisfaction during the previous 2 weeks, individuals with higher life satisfaction rated the global domains in general as more satisfying than those with lower life satisfaction. Overall, the association between globallife satisfaction and evaluative enhancement of global domains was most consistent in "self" and "social relationships." Finally, the effect of global life satisfaction on evaluative enhancement remained significant, controlling for extraversion and neuroticism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In two daily diary studies we examined the moderating role of sensation seeking in the patterns of relations between physical pleasure and life satisfaction. In study 1 (a 52-day daily diary study), daily physical pleasure was a significantly stronger predictor of daily social satisfaction among high sensation seekers than among low sensation seekers. We extended the finding of study 1 to more general daily satisfaction in study 2 (a 23-day diary study). The present findings indicate that physical pleasure is associated with daily satisfaction to the degree that one seeks for such an experience. In addition, we tested whether the association between physical pleasure and daily satisfaction would be moderated also by other facets of extraversion and extraversion as a whole. With the exception of the positive emotion facet in study 1, no facet or extraversion as a whole moderated the relation between physical pleasure and daily satisfaction. The present studies show specificity and replicability of the role that sensation seeking plays in understanding the link between daily physical pleasure and daily satisfaction. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigated individual differences in the processes of subjective well-being (SWB). There were considerable individual differences in the domain that was most strongly associated with global life satisfaction. Individuals also differed significantly in the types of activities that they found satisfying. Moreover, these individual differences in the patterns of SWB were systematically related to value orientations. A 23-day daily diary study revealed that intraindividual changes in satisfaction were strongly influenced by the degree of success in the domains that individuals value. The present findings highlight the meaningful individual differences in the qualitative aspects of subjective well-being. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We explored whether rising income in nations is associated with increasing subjective well-being (SWB), with several advances over earlier work. Our methods are improved in that across time, the same well-being questions were asked in the same order, and we employed broad and equivalent representative samples over time from a large number of nations. We also assessed psychosocial factors that might mediate the relation of income and SWB. We found that changes in household income were associated with concomitant changes in life evaluations, positive feelings, and negative feelings. The effects of gross domestic product (GDP) change were weaker and significant only for life evaluations, perhaps because GDP was a less certain index of the standard of living of the average household. The association of income and SWB is more likely to occur when the average person's material welfare accompanies rising income, when people become more satisfied with their finances, and when people become more optimistic about their futures. People did not adapt to the income rises during the period of years we studied, in that income rises produced SWB increases that did not return to earlier levels. It appears that previous researchers failed to come to agreement because of the small sample sizes of the nations, the inconsistent methods across years and surveys, and the lack of nieasures of potential mediating variables. Analyses of income relative to people in one's nation and between-nation slopes together suggest that income standards are now largely global, with little effect of national social comparison. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Anusic, Schimmack, Pinkus, and Lockwood (2009) developed the halo-alpha-beta (HAB) model to separate halo variance from variance due to valid personality traits and other sources of measurement error in self-ratings of personality. The authors used a twin-HAB model of self-ratings and ratings of a partner (friend or dating partner) to test several hypotheses about culture, evaluative biases in self- and other-perceptions, and well-being. Participants were friends or dating partners who reported on their own and their partner's personality and well-being (N = 906 students). European Canadians had higher general evaluative biases (GEB) than Asian Canadians. There were no cultural differences in self- enhancement or other-enhancement. GEB significantly predicted self-ratings of life satisfaction, but not informant ratings of well-being. GEB fully mediated the effect of culture on self-ratings of life satisfaction. The results suggest that North American culture encourages positive biases in self- and other-perceptions. These biases also influence self-ratings of life satisfaction but have a much weaker effect on informant ratings of life satisfaction. The implications of these findings for cultural differences in well-being are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The present research examined whether people feel happier and healthier when they feel more understood in daily social interactions. A two-week diary study showed that people reported greater life satisfaction and fewer physical symptoms on days in which they felt more understood by others. Moreover, we found that individuals who tend to see themselves in relations to others (i.e., women or those scored high on interdependent self-construal measure) showed a stronger association between daily felt understanding and daily life satisfaction or physical symptoms. These findings demonstrate that daily social experiences, such as felt understanding, are associated with daily well-being, particularly for individuals with greater interdependent self-construal. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Eudaimonic theories of well-being assert the importance of achieving one’s full potential through engaging in inherently meaningful endeavors. In two daily diary studies, we assessed whether reports of engagement in behaviors representative of eudaimonic theories were associated with well-being. We also examined whether eudaimonic behaviors were more strongly related to well-being than behaviors directed toward obtaining pleasure or material goods. In both studies, eudaimonic behaviors had consistently stronger relations to well-being than hedonic behaviors. Data also provided support for a temporal sequence in which eudaimonic behaviors were related to greater well-being the next day. Overall, our results suggest that “doing good” may be an important avenue by which people create meaningful and satisfying lives. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Counseling psychologists often work with clients to increase their well-being as well as to decrease their distress. One important aspect of well-being, highlighted particularly in humanistic theories of the counseling process, is perceived meaning in life. However, poor measurement has hampered research on meaning in life. In 3 studies, evidence is provided for the internal consistency, temporal stability, factor structure, and validity of the Meaning in Life Questionnaire (MLQ), a new 10-item measure of the presence of, and the search for, meaning in life. A multitrait-multimethod matrix demonstrates the convergent and discriminant validity of the MLQ subscales across time and informants, in comparison with 2 other meaning scales. The MLQ offers several improvements over current meaning in life measures, including no item overlap with distress measures, a stable factor structure, better discriminant validity, a briefer format, and the ability to measure the search for meaning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In our 1996 article, “Most People are Happy,” we presented evidence showing that the majority of humans are above neutral in happiness. The article was popular perhaps for several reasons. First, we shed light on the ubiquity of positive or pleasant emotions, whereas previously many scholars had focused on negative or unpleasant ones. Second, our article may have received attention because, as we showed, most people believe that humans are much less happy than they actually are. Thus, our article provided an impetus for understanding the role of positive emotions as well as illuminating an important aspect of human happiness—the fact that happiness is not unusual but may be the default condition. In the current article, we review evidence from the first representative sample of humanity, the Gallup World Poll, and include many more nations that are very poor and troubled. We find that the majority of people are above neutral in affect balance but not life satisfaction. Furthermore, there are extremely bad life circumstances in which most people are below neutral in affect balance as well. This suggests that one explanation for most people’s happiness is that most societies, but not all, can meet enough human needs that they provide the conditions for human happiness. Finally, our findings suggest that human happiness is not just in our heads or genes but is also influenced by personal and societal circumstances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a past Psychological Science article, Diener and Seligman (2002) explored the characteristics of extremely happy individuals and found that strong social relationships characterized the entire group. The study was popular, perhaps because the authors focused on the very happiest people, not merely on correlations across the entire spectrum of subjective well-being. In the current study, we replicated and extended the earlier paper here by examining, in a world sample, the differences between the happiest individuals and unhappy and averagely happy people. We largely replicated earlier findings; basic need fulfillment and social resources were two ingredients for high subjective well-being. Replicating and extending the earlier findings, we found that, compared with the averagely happy people, the happiest people were more likely to come from societies high in subjective well-being and social capital. To achieve very high happiness, it is helpful not only to have desirable personal circumstances, but also to live in a prosperous happy society with strong social support. As in the original study, although a few characteristics seemed virtually necessary for subjective well-being (SWB), no characteristic guaranteed it. We also uncovered variables separating the groups that might be outcomes of SWB, for example, helping others, exercising, and not smoking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]