A psychology of satisfaction

Content provided by the Faculty of the Harvard Medical School

A psychology of satisfaction

Proponents of positive psychology want to find out what makes us happy.

If your thoughts, feelings, or actions made you miserable or caused problems at work or at home, you might well contact a psychiatrist or psychologist — and you would probably feel confident that the approaches she suggests, whether medication or talk therapy, are grounded in experience and research. But what if you were feeling okay, but suspected you could enjoy life more, or feel more fulfilled than you do now? Although not as well recognized, increasing people’s pleasure, satisfaction, and joy in life is also an important and appropriate focus of psychotherapy, and it is increasingly considered a worthy subject for serious scientific research.

Although there have long been strands of psychological research and practice aimed at aspects of happiness, the field received a boost when Martin E.P. Seligman, Ph.D., of the University of Pennsylvania, became president of the American Psychological Association in 1998 and introduced the term “positive psychology,” calling on colleagues to undertake a systematic and evidence-based approach to the pursuit of happiness.

Proponents of positive psychology find it helpful to distinguish three routes to happiness: positive feelings, active engagement in life, and having a sense of purpose or meaning outside oneself. In an article in American Psychologist, researchers noted that people who experience the greatest satisfaction in life pursue all three routes — and especially the last two: active engagement and greater purpose.

Positive feelings

To some extent, positive feelings may fluctuate around an inborn “set point.” Yet according to positive psychologists, anyone can learn to increase positive feelings, though people with lower overall happiness levels may need to work at it harder — much as people with a higher set point for their weight would need to put more effort into keeping the pounds off. Mindfulness is one key to increasing positive feelings and enjoying the present, according to Harvard psychologist Ellen J. Langer, Ph.D., who spoke at the Fifth International Summit on Positive Psychology in September 2005.

Mindfulness, Langer says, is one benefit of meditation, but it can also be nurtured in other, perhaps simpler, ways. “All mindfulness takes is to actively notice new things without evaluating or categorizing them. …We often take less enjoyment in our relationships or work because we expect that things will be the same-old, same-old,” she says. Other researchers have found that we can make positive feelings last longer when we deliberately take a “mental picture” of pleasurable events to share with others or recall later.

Of course, in the present, we can also experience positive feelings about the past (such as gratitude and contentment) and the future (hope and optimism). For example, at the September 2005 summit, Sonja Lyubomirsky, Ph.D., of the University of California, Riverside, reported on research in which she assigned one group of volunteers to keep weekly “gratitude journals.” Compared to a non-journal-keeping control group, the group that tracked the times they felt thankful scored higher on measures of happiness and well-being six weeks later.

Active engagement

Activities that bring happiness needn’t be strictly warm and fuzzy. For example, you can be cold and tired near the end of a cross-country ski trek but be fully absorbed at the time and look back on the experience with pleasure and satisfaction. This underscores a second aspect of happiness — active engagement, or what University of Chicago psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi calls “flow.”

In analyzing what leads to flow, Csikszentmihalyi and other positive psychology researchers have found that we are more likely to be fully engaged when we are active rather than passive, and when the activity requires skill and focus. The most engaging activities are neither so difficult that we’re overwhelmed nor so easy that we can do them without paying much attention. In one study, Csikszentmihalyi beeped subjects at random times during the day, gathering information about what they were doing and how they felt about it. He reported that people felt happier, stronger, more creative, and more satisfied when engaged in activities involving challenge and skill — whether at work or leisure. Passively watching television conferred less happiness than driving, playing a game or musical instrument, or working.

Langer maintains that we can enter the flow of challenging creative endeavors even if we don’t see ourselves as particularly skilled, especially by expecting and embracing mistakes. In her research, Langer asks participants to do creative projects — and gives them instructions that virtually guarantee they’ll make mistakes in the process. Participants who are warned at the outset to expect mistakes (and incorporate them into their projects) produce more creative and satisfying work than those instructed simply to do their best.

Other studies show that avoiding time pressures and participating in something beforehand that makes you relaxed and happy can help make it easier to engage in creative activities.

Seeking meaning

Positive psychology’s third route to happiness entails applying your strengths (see “What are your strengths?”) to something outside yourself to create meaning in life, whether that involves nature, art, community, spirituality, or something else.

For example, Lyubomirsky assigned volunteers to perform five acts of kindness per week for six weeks. Those who plunged in and did five in a single day scored significantly higher on measures of well-being afterward than control subjects who did not receive the assignment. On the other hand, volunteers who spread their acts of kindness throughout the week did not experience a boost in well-being. The researchers are trying to figure out why.

Applications and implications

For now, positive psychology is an evolving field that is actively seeking evidence about the routes to happiness and well-being, so that psychotherapists might use them to supplement interventions they already employ to help people in trouble.

A randomized trial of positive psychology exercises (see “Randomized trial of happiness exercises”) showed promise that depressive symptoms might be lessened by teaching people to identify and use their strengths. This could be an adjunct to therapies that help depressed people learn how to interrupt patterns of behavior that invite depression relapse.

Many psychologists and psychiatrists already take a strengths-based approach to therapy. Feminist psychology, humanistic psychology, and cognitive behavioral therapy have all contributed to this new emphasis on positive traits.

A word of caution

Positive psychology is taking shape in a world already packed with self-help books that promise happiness and fulfillment. Also, a variety of people (professional and not) are offering their services as “happiness coaches” and “life coaches.” Some have taken courses conducted by leaders in positive psychology. But these courses don’t train people as therapists — they only teach the basic tenets and research evidence on positive psychology.

Coaching is not therapy, and without some background in psychotherapy, a coach may not recognize serious problems that are better treated using medications or talk therapy. Nor can such a coach help you make sense of the strong emotions that may emerge during the process. Moreover, serious mental illness does not respond to positive psychology or coaching. Schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, severe anxiety or depression, and eating disorders, for example, need diagnosis and appropriate treatment.

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Last updated:	August 21, 2006