Chapter 7: Happiness Flashcards
What definition does the book use for happiness?
Happiness is derived from the extent to which he or she experiences positive emotions in everyday life.
What is affective forecasting?
The process by which people generate predictions about the emotional effects of future life events.
What is impact bias?
The tendency to exaggerate the strength and duration of anticipated or future emotional reactions.
What is focalism?
When people focus on one element in their lives to the expense of others.
What is memory bias?
When people base their affective forecasts on memories of similar experiences in the past.
What are two types of memory bias?
- Emotion congruent retrieval. 2. Peak-end rule.
What is the emotion congruent retrieval memory bias?
When people remember past events of features of past events not as they actually happened, but with the same emotional tone as the state they are currently in.
What is the peak-end rule memory bias?
When people tend to recall their emotions in a way that neglects the duration of the event that caused the emotions and is summarized by an average of the most intense emotion and the emotional intensity at the very end of the event or time period.
Does research show that “variety is the spice of life” or routine and fewer choices is associated with more satisfaction?
Routine and fewer choices.
What is hedonic adaptation?
People’s tendency to habituate to the impact of repeated emotional experiences.
What did a study focused on winning the lottery and suffering a debilitating accident find?
They found hedonic adaptation. People tend to return to their baseline even after a major negative or positive experience.
In theory, if people didn’t experience hedonic adaption, what would happen?
They would get overwhelmed or exhausted with their environment.
What three factors make up happiness?
- Genes. 2. Life circumstances. 3. Daily life.
About what percent of happiness can be explained by a genetic factor?
About 50%.
What percent of happiness is influenced by life circumstances?
Around 10%.
What percent of happiness is influenced by daily life?
Around 40%.
What are five examples of behaviors that increase happiness?
- Gratitude. 2. Savoring. 3. Mindfulness. 4. Positive relationships. 5. Generosity and helping.
What is gratitude?
A state marked by a sense of wonder, thankfulness, and appreciation for life that can be expressed toward other people, as well as toward impersonal (nature) or nonhuman entities (god).
Emmons and McCullough (2003) conducted a study where they randomly assigned participants to list five things they were grateful for daily. What were their results? (3)
- They found that people who listed these things reported increased alertness, energy, enthusiasm, and more optimism for the future. 2. Social well-being improved. 3. Physical well-being improved.
What is a tendency that may have evolved in the past, but may not be adaptive today?
Negativity bias.
What is negativity bias?
When people focus their attention more on the negative than the positive.
What is the evolutionary explanation for negativity bias? (2)
- The brain’s seeking system makes us more sensitive to moving ahead and acquiring more than in relishing the fruits of out labors. 2. People who continued to want more in the past may have fared better.
Why could practicing gratitude be effective in increasing happiness (considering the negativity bias)?
Gratitude may counteract negative bias and out brains’ seeking system.
What is savoring?
The capacity to attend to the joys and pleasures of experience.
What is mindfulness?
The awareness that arises from paying attention to the present moment on purpose and without judgement.
What are three mindfulness-based exercises?
- Body scan mediation. 2. Sitting meditation. 3. Walking meditation.
What is subjective well-being?
Happiness.
What is psychological well-being?
Being engaged with and able to manage life’s challenges.
What “two selves” are there?
- Experiencing self. 2. Remembering self.
What is the experiencing self? (2)
- Being happy in your life. 2. Lives in the present.
What is the remembering self? (3)
- Being happy about your life. 2. Keeps score. 3. The story teller of our life.
What are two components of happiness?
- Feeling. 2. Cognitive.
Describe the feeling component of happiness. (3)
- What makes someone feel happy. 2. Pleasure and positive emotions. 3. More immediate.
Describe the cognitive component of happiness. (3)
- What makes a happy life? 2. Meaning and satisfaction. 3. More abstract.
Does the feeling component of happiness represent the experiencing self or the remembering self?
The experiencing self.
Does the remembering self represent the feeling or cognitive component of happiness?
The cognitive component.
How do we know that genes contribute around 50% to one’s level of happiness?
Twin studies - twins who share all their genes have significantly more similar levels of happiness than twins who share half their genes.
Describe the idea of “Happiness set-points.”
Despite ups and downs, we return to our set points.
What is one way that genes may contribute to happiness?
By setting out “happiness set point.”
What were the results of the Framingham Heart Study on social networks and happiness? (2)
- Happy individuals tend to be located in the center of their local social networks and in large clusters of other happy people. 2. An individual tended to be happy when others, especially same-sex others in their social network were happy.
At what point does income stop being associated with increased happiness?
At around $75,000.
What is the optimism bias?
Making unrealistically optimistic predictions about the future, especially their own future.
Is optimism associated with happiness?
Yes and no. It may make people more susceptible to disappointment, but it may be that optimistic people do not give up when it would be more healthy to.
