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Long-running German Panel Survey Shows That Personal and Economic Choices, Not Just Genes, Matter for Happiness

Overview
Journal Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A
Specialty Science
Date 2010 Oct 6
PMID 20921399
Citations 29
Authors
Bruce Headey
Ruud Muffels
Gert G Wagner
Affiliations
Soon will be listed here.
Abstract

Psychologists and economists take contradictory approaches to research on what psychologists call happiness or subjective well-being, and economists call subjective utility. A direct test of the most widely accepted psychological theory, set-point theory, shows it to be flawed. Results are then given, using the economists' newer "choice approach"--an approach also favored by positive psychologists--which yields substantial payoffs in explaining long-term changes in happiness. Data come from the German Socio-Economic Panel (1984-2008), a unique 25-y prospective longitudinal survey. This dataset enables direct tests of theories explaining long-term happiness.

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