Category: Happiness

From the mental health benefits of gardening to the healing power of birdsong — explore the psychology of nature.

People are spending less and less time enjoying the outdoors and nature with every passing year.

The recent shift away from nature has been incredible: some studies estimate people now spend 25 percent less time in nature than they did 20 years ago (Pergams & Zaradic, 2007).

Instead, recreational time is often spent online, playing video games and watching movies.

The psychological literature clearly reveals how beneficial the experience of nature is to our minds.

In nature people feel more alive, creative, in sync and less stressed.

Here are 7 psychology studies from the members-only section of PsyBlog exploring the psychology of nature.

(If you are not already, find out how to become a PsyBlog member here.)

1. The Great Disconnect: How Humans Are Losing Touch With Nature
2. The Reason Being In Nature Feels So Good
3. How Nature Heals The Brain Of Stress
4. The Mental Health Benefits Of Gardening
5. How Nature Can Lower Your Risk Of Dementia
6. Spend This Long In Nature To Feel Fantastic
7. The Beautiful Sound That Reduces Anxiety, Paranoia And Depression

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For the study, 582 people described strategies for improving their well-being.

People who take up hobbies or interests that involve other people are happier one year later, research finds.

In comparison to those using non-social strategies, the socially focused were more satisfied with life.

Ms Julia Rohrer, the study’s first author, said:

“Our research showed that people who came up with ‘well-being’ strategies that involved other people were more satisfied with their lives one year later — even after taking into account that they were marginally happier to begin with.

In contrast, people who came up with strategies that did not explicitly involve others remained, on average, as satisfied as they were.”

For the study, 582 people described strategies for improving their well-being.

Some suggested non-social things like giving up smoking.

Others chose social things like spending more time with their family and friends or helping others.

The life satisfaction of those choosing nonsocial things remained the same one year later, while those who chose social things saw improvements in life satisfaction.

Ms Rohrer said:

“Many people are interested in becoming happier, but there is a lack of evidence regarding the long term effects of pursuing happiness through various types of activities.

After all, there’s no guarantee that trying to become happier doesn’t make you more miserable in the end.

I think our study partly fills that gap in the literature, although more research with a longitudinal perspective is certainly needed.”

The study was published in the journal Psychological Science (Rohrer et al., 2018).

The question is a test of how connected you feel to your future self and it can reveal your future happiness.

Take a moment to imagine your personality 10 years from now.

Do you think you will be more or less wise, energetic, willing to learn, caring and knowledgeable?

Or, perhaps you feel you will be much the same?

The question is a test of how connected you feel to your future self and it can reveal your future happiness.

According to a recent study, people who feel they will remain the same in the future are happier.

In contrast, people who feel they will decline and also, surprisingly, improve, were both less satisfied with life ten years later.

The reason is that feeling connected to one’s future self is linked to taking care of one’s health, financial situation and delaying gratification.

On the other hand, those who predict they will change fail to take the same care of themselves.

It may also be that predicting no change in oneself is a sign of contentment with one’s identity.

Mr Joseph Reiff , the study’s first author, said:

“The more people initially predicted that they would remain the same — whether predicting less decline or less improvement across a number of core traits — the more satisfied they typically were with their lives ten years later.”

The study included 4,963 people who were asked to estimate aspects of their future selves.

They answered questions like:

• “How calm and even-tempered do you think you will be 10
  years from now?”

The survey included other questions asking about wisdom, energy, willingness to learn and being caring and knowledgeable.

The results revealed that people who expected themselves to improve or get worse over the 10 years both had lower levels of life satisfaction.

Those who thought they would remain much the same, though, were happiest.

Dr Hal Hershfield, study co-author, said:

“We are now interested in understanding why some people think they will remain the same and why others think they will change.

What life events, for example, cause people to shift the way they think about their future selves?”

The study was published in the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science (Reiff et al., 2019)

The best personality traits for happiness differ for work and play.

The personality trait most strongly linked to happiness right across the lifespan is emotional stability, research finds.

People who are high in emotional stability, which is the opposite of being neurotic, tend to be positive, have high self-control along with the ability to manage psychological stress effectively.

Looking specifically at work and social satisfaction, though, other personality traits were also important along with emotional stability.

For work satisfaction, the best personality trait was conscientiousness, a trait linked to being self-disciplined and aiming for achievement.

For social satisfaction, though, extraversion and agreeableness were most strongly linked to happiness.

Happiness across the lifespan

The conclusions come from a study exploring how the link between personality and happiness might change with age.

Dr Gabriel Olaru, the study’s first author, said:

“Many studies have shown that people with certain personality profiles are more satisfied with their life than others.

Yet, it had not been extensively studied whether this holds true across the lifespan.

For example, extraverted—that is sociable, talkative—people might be particularly happy in young adulthood, when they typically are forming new social relationships.

We thus wanted to examine if some personality traits are more or less relevant to life, social and work satisfaction in specific life phases.”

The study included over 9,000 Dutch adults of all ages who were tracked over more than a decade.

The results showed that the connections between life satisfaction and personality remained much the same over the lifespan.

Dr Manon van Scheppingen, study co-author, said:

“Our findings show that—despite differences in life challenges and social roles—personality traits are relevant for our satisfaction with life, work and social contacts across young, middle and older adulthood.

The personality traits remained equally relevant across the adult lifespan, or became even more interconnected in some cases for work satisfaction.”

Personality and environment interact

People’s personality also interacts with the environment, explained Dr van Scheppingen:

“A good example of how personality interacts with the environment can be found in the work context.

One of our findings was that the link between emotional stability and work satisfaction increases across age.

This might be explained by the fact that emotionally stable people are less scared to quit unsatisfactory jobs and more likely to apply for jobs that are more challenging and perhaps more fulfilling and enjoyable in the long run.”

Despite what many believe, personality is capable of change, said Dr van Scheppingen:

“While we did not examine what caused these changes, [the research] shows that our personalities and our happiness are not set in stone.

Perhaps we may even be able to influence how we change: If we try to become more organized, outgoing, friendly, this might increase life, social or work satisfaction as well.”

→ Related: How To Change Your Personality

The study was published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (Olaru et al., 2023).

Even James Dean looked cooler when he smiled.

People are rated as looking ‘cooler’ when they smile and show their emotions, research finds.

It rubbishes the popular idea that keeping an inexpressive poker face makes you look ‘cool’.

In fact, an inexpressive face makes people look colder, rather than cool.

Dr Caleb Warren, the study’s first author, said:

“We found over and over again that people are perceived to be cooler when they smile compared to when they are inexpressive in print advertisements.

Being inexpressive makes people seem unfriendly or cold rather than cool.”

For the study people were shown a series of adverts in which celebrities were either smiling or not smiling.

It included well-know people, such as James Dean, Emily Didonato and Michael Jordan, alongside less well-known models.

People rated how cool the model seemed when they were smiling versus not smiling.

James Dean, for example, was rated ‘cooler’ in photographs where he was smiling, which surprised the researchers.

James Dean is an icon of cool and often pictured with a sultry, half-frown.

There was only one exception to the general rule that smiling was cool.

That was when mixed martial arts fighters were facing off at a press conference.

Then, it wasn’t cool to smile — better to look tough and serious.

A serious face is more dominant, and looks cooler when the situation demands dominance.

Dr Warren said:

“This inaccurate belief about how to become cool can influence the way we communicate with others, and being inexpressive can hurt relationships.

It also makes it more difficult to understand one another.

For these reasons, being inexpressive isn’t necessarily cool.”

The study was published in the Journal of Consumer Psychology (Warren et al., 2018).