Behavioural Sciences can help us be happier

Most people want to become happier in their lives. (1)

To this end, our world has produced an abundance of ‘self-help’ books; with aisles at bookstores and libraries always packed. Not to mention the gazillion places on the internet where people can learn about getting happier.

So the question is: If there is so much information out there on “how” to get happier – AND, people are readily seeking out this information – then why isn’t our society filled with multitudes of happy people?

Both the answer to this question and the dilemma of trying to be happier can be found in the lessons we learn from research in the behavioural sciences.

Back in the 1950’s & 60’s economists were starting to realize that traditional economic theories could not fully explain all of market behaviour. Something was missing in the equation, and it turns out that it was the human element. (2)

It is humans that do the human behaviour and the decision-making; so let’s study the humans. Makes sense.

By the mid 60’s and 1970’s social and cognitive psychologists Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky applied human psychology (e.g., beliefs & choices) to economic problems, and the answers they found stunned people.

“Guess what?” they said, “People are not rational (like economic theories always assumed) – indeed people are irrational.” (3-5).

Through 40 years of research (and a Nobel prize), Kahneman and his colleagues have showed us that people tend to make decisions that are fast, automatic, effortless, associative, and often emotionally charged. (3-5).

Furthermore, we are far more governed by habit than we realize. (5) [If you’re interested in the many cognitive biases we have, click here for this comprehensive infographic].

Since the 1960’s research in psychology has exploded.

For example, how brains work (cognitive psychology and neuro-psychology) and how people interact with each other and develop attitudes and beliefs (social psychology).

So what can behavioural economics tell us about why we are all not gloriously happy?

The answer is twofold:

The first and most obvious answer (stemming directly from modern BE principles) is that people are bombarded with information.

Information overload occurs when the stuff trying to get in exceeds the processing capacity. Because humans have limited processing capacity, an overload of information tends to render us confused. (6)

Just about everyone is writing about happiness and talking about happiness – so much so that we’ve come to the point where there is just too much information, and we don’t know who to believe.

The second answer might not be so obvious – and I do speculate - but I wonder if maybe we don’t actually want to be gloriously happy.

In several of my PhD research studies 50% of the participants indicated that they would be “happy” to just be “content.” In other words, they weren’t aiming for happiness as a goal; Contentment was good enough for them. (7)

It might seem odd that some people might settle for contentment (given the high social value placed on achievement these days).

However, wanting contentment is not new.

Contentment is a key premise in many religious teachings; going all the way back to ancient Greek philosopher Socrates who proclaimed “Contentment is natural wealth; whereas luxury is artificial poverty.”

How can we use behavioural economics to be happier?

Let’s face it, most of us would probably like a little extra pep in our step – get a little boost in our mood – get a little happier - - feel a little more satisfied with life.

Why not, right?

If you want to be happier, change your behaviour first

In Paul Dolan’s book Happiness by Design: Change What You Do, Not How You Think, Dolan highlights significant evidence that our behaviours (i.e., the actual movements that we do) have big effects on our attitudes and how we feel. (8)

For example, there is the classic Strack study done in 1988 where ½ the people are asked to put a pencil in their mouth for 1 minute and the other half do not. Interestingly, the people with the pencil in their mouth felt an elevation in their mood afterwards. Why? Because the pencil forced their mouth muscles to make the smiling posture. (9)

With a pencil in the mouth, the muscles send a signal to the brain about what it is doing and the brain responds with an elevated mood. Pretty cool, huh?

But there's more. What we do in one moment (and how we feel) can than have "behavioural spillover" effects - guiding what we do next. However, as Dolan explains, the issue is often that we do not pay attention to our own feedback.

Let's say that putting a pencil in our mouth makes us happy - what we need to do next is then recognize this feeling - orient our attention to what actually makes us happy. Then, by knowing what makes us happy, we can then try to engage in similar behaviours at other times.

If we don't attend to something (e.g., positive emotions) then we don't give it much weight - in fact, we might miss it altogether. We might not pay attention to the fact that putting a pencil in our mouths makes us happy.

There is so much information competing for our attention, therefore, it is what we "attend to" that contributes to how we see ourselves and the world around us.

Says Dolan, "If the misallocation of attention is our fundamental problem, the reallocation of attention must be the fundamental solution."

Dolan suggests that we can decide to pay attention to what make us happy. Then we can design our surroundings so as to nudge our behaviour without having to think too much about it.

And, finally, we are much happier when we pay attention to activities within our close social connections (e.g., conversations with friends and family).

Now that we understand that behaviour can affect the way we feel (and not just the other way around) – the key takeaway is that we need to change some of the things that we do first in order to affect how we feel.

Practicing gratitude is a very beneficial behaviour to do

Over 10,000 studies in the field of gratitude all point to the same thing: Giving thanks makes people happier, healthier, less stressed, less depressed, and more satisfied with their lives and their relationships. (10) Grateful people also sleep better, worry less, and laugh more. (10)

If thanks are directed to specific others (as opposed to general feelings of thankfulness), the receivers of thanks get a boost to their happiness as well (11). All in all, a “win-win” situation.

Most of the empirical work in gratitude suggests that people should try to spend time reflecting on something (or someone) they are grateful for every day.

Better yet – write a personal note and drop it in the mail.

Reflecting every day will develop your gratitude practice into a formidable habit!

As Daniel Kahneman might say, positive habits are some of our best tools when we are thinking fast, automatic, effortless, associative, and with emotional charge.

SUMMARY

Thanks to the important work of behavioural scientists and in psychology as a whole, we now have the ability to understand a little more about the ways in which we can help society be happier and a better place to live.

Giving thanks generates the greatest harmony and well-being because it benefits both the giver and the receiver.

If you are interested in learning more about how to practice gratitude, I recommend Paul Dolan’s book listed below and the Happify website as good places to start. If you like the sciencey stuff, any of the articles listed below are all good reads.

Dr. Cindy Ward is a native of Kitchener, Ontario, Canada and has a PhD in social and behavioural psychology from Wilfrid Laurier University. Cindy is a Sr. Associate at BEworks and studies human motivation. She really likes Self-Determination Theory and Maslow’s hierarchy of needs as good theories for “why people do what they do.” She also dabbles in ‘death’ (ahem . . . I mean terror management theory). Most of all, though, Cindy likes to debate. So, if you disagree or have any comments, please email her at drcindywardphd@gmail.com

REFERENCES

Lyubomirsky, S., Sheldon, K. M., & Schkade, D. (2005). Pursuing happiness: The architecture of sustainable change. Review of general psychology, 9(2), 111.
Kahneman, D. (2003). A psychological perspective on economics. The American economic review, 93(2), 162-168.
Kahneman, D. (1973). Attention and effort (p. 246). Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Kahneman, D., & Tversky, A. (1973). On the psychology of prediction. Psychological review, 80(4), 237.
Kahneman, D. (2003). Maps of bounded rationality: Psychology for behavioral economics. The American economic review, 93(5), 1449-1475.
Iyengar, S. S., & Lepper, M. R. (2000). When choice is demotivating: Can one desire too much of a good thing?. Journal of personality and social psychology, 79(6), 995-1006.
Ward, C. L., Wilson, A. E., & Buote, V. (2015, February). How do people define happiness? Presented at the 16th annual convention of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Long Beach, CA.
Dolan, P. (2014). Happiness by design: Change what you do, not how you think. Penguin.
Strack, F., Martin, L. L., & Stepper, S. (1988). Inhibiting and facilitating conditions of the human smile: a nonobtrusive test of the facial feedback hypothesis. Journal of personality and social psychology, 54(5), 768.
Emmons, R. A., & McCullough, M. E. (2003). Counting blessings versus burdens: an experimental investigation of gratitude and subjective well-being in daily life. Journal of personality and social psychology, 84(2), 377.
Steele, C. M. (1988). The psychology of self-affirmation: Sustaining the integrity of the self. Advances in experimental social psychology, 21, 261-302.
Maslow, A. H. (1943). A theory of human motivation. Psychological review,50(4), 370.