Psychological Correlates of Happiness

Indian Journal of Social Science Researches Vol. 7 (1), March, 2010, pp 60-64 ISSN : 0974-9837 Psychological Correlates of Happiness Sadhan Das Gupta* & Debleena Kumar** The present study attempts to investigate various psychological correlates of happiness in a group of non clinical population. Oxford Happiness Questionnaire, Attributional Style Questionnaire, Presumptive stressful life events scale, Neo Five Factor Inventory and the Parental Bonding Instrument were administered individually to 40 employed adults (age range 2328 years). The correlation of happiness with other psychological variables was examined using Pearson’s product moment correlation coefficient. The findings revealed that parental care (especially mother’s) and positive attribution style were found to be related with happiness. It was also observed that personality traits of extraversion and openness to experience were positively related with happiness whereas neuroticism was inversely related with happiness. Keywords: attributional style, happiness, personality, well- being The happiness can be defined as an individual’s global assessment of positive/ negative emotional experiences and satisfaction with life. In ordinary use the term happiness has to do with one’s situation (one is fortunate) or with one’s state of mind (one is glad, cheerful) or typically with both. If one is concerned with a long stretch of time, one is likely to focus on situation than on state of mind. Happiness has been conceived to have both affective and cognitive components- the affective component called “hedonic level” is “the degree to which the various affects a person experience are pleasant”, while the cognitive component called “contentment” is “the degree to which an individual perceives his aspiration to be met” (Bruni, 2004; Haybron, 2003; Sirgy et al., 2006). Argyle and associates (1989) defined happiness as the average level of satisfaction over a specific period along with the frequency and degree of positive affect and the relative absence of negative affect. According to Furnham and Cheng (2000), happiness refers to one’s current state of joy (a mood) which is generally short in duration and less stable. During the last couple of decades researchers have focused on the role of certain personality traits, stressful experiences and cognitive appraisal of situations (such as attribution style) in deterring the life happiness. A considerable body of research has concentrated on attributional style and its effects on depression and anxiety. Attributional style is a cognitive personality characteristic that was first introduced by Abramson et al. (1978) and elaborated by others (Metalsky et al., 1982; Peterson et al., 1982). Abramson and associates (1978) speculated that a depressive attributional style characterized by the tendency to view negative events as caused by factors that are internal (personal), stable (permanent), and global (pervasive) which, they argued, was a risk factor for the development of helplessness and, in turn, depression. Many studies have demonstrated the relationship between attributional explanatory style and unhappiness and mental illness. Many researchers like Herz and Gullone (1999) have argued that the quality of the parent–child relationship has a significant impact on the long-term confidence, resilience and well-being of individuals. Others showed that both father and mother involvement contributed significantly and independently to the happiness of offspring (Flouri & *Address correspondence to Dr. Sadhan Das Gupta, Reader, Department of Applied Psychology, University of Calcutta, 92 APC Road. Kolkata-9. Email: [email protected] **Research Scholar, Department of Applied Psychology. University of Calcutta. 92 APC Road. Kolkata-9. Email: [email protected] Psychological Correlates of Happiness 61 Buchanan, 2003). Also, maternal care was found to be a direct correlate of happiness ( Cheng & Furnham,2004). Many studies have reported personality trait as correlates of happiness. Furnham and Brewin (1990) looked at the correlates of happiness and reported a positive correlation for scores on happiness with those on extraversion, and negative correlation with those on neuroticism. Neuroticism and extraversion were also found to be significant predictors of happiness (Lu and Hu ,2005). Subjective well-being was found to be positively related with extraversion (Harrington and Lofredo, 2001). In an epidemiological context, it would be of practical use to have good measurement tool of happiness and well-being and to be able to determine also what are the key psychosocial and environmental factors that affect well-being and happiness . Amongst these factors are major life events and experiences that occur throughout the life course. Such events have often been classified on the basis of their association with depression and ill-health and of how stressful they are in various contexts (Kessing and Agerbo, 2003). Cumulative exposure to ‘negative’ major life events throughout the life course may be linked to increased risks of chronic unhappiness, mental illness and premature mortality. In contrast, cumulative lifetime exposure to ‘positive’ major life events may be associated with increased probabilities of sustained happiness, good health and well-being (Clark and Oswald, 2002). Considering the above theoretical basis, present study aims to examine the role of attributional style, personality, perceived parental rearing style and stressful life-events as correlates of happiness of employed adults. The main objectives of the study were- to determine the relationship of attributional style, personality traits, stressful life events and perceived parental rearing style with happiness. Method Sample Fourty employed young adults; aged between 2328 years, participated in this study, among which 17 were males and 23 females. Their academic qualification was at least graduation level. Only unmarried subjects were selected and divorcee candidates were excluded. Only heterosexually oriented subjects were included (this was confirmed through personal interview). All participants were from middle income group and from urban setup. All participants were employed. The subjects were not having any significant psychological and physical health problems as indicated by General Health Questionnaire(GHQ28). Tools 1. Oxford Happiness Questionnaire (Argyle and Hills, 2000) is a 29 item measure of happiness that utilizes a six point rating scale of agreement ranging from 1(strongly agree) to 6 (strongly disagree). Reliability for this scale has been found to be 0.91. 2. Attributional Style Questionnaire (Peterson et al., 1982) presents 12 hypothetical situations, half with positive outcomes and half with negative outcomes. It was designed to measure individual differences in the use of three attributional styles: internality, stability, and globality. It has been demonstrated to have Cronbach’s alpha of 0.75 for the positive events and 0.72 for the negative events. Reliabilities for the six subscales ranged from 0.44 to 0.69 in the previous studies. 3. Pressumptive stressful life events scale (Singh et al, 1983) consists of 51 items and is used to measure number of life events and presumptive stress in last one year and life. 4. Neo Five Factor Inventory- It is a short version of the Revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO PI-R) based 62 Gupta & Kumar on the five-factor model of personality (Costa & McCrae, 1992). Each of the five personality traits is measured by twelve items, which makes a total of sixty items. The items are rated on a five-point scales ranging from strongly disagree to strongly agree. 5. The Parental Bonding Instrument (Parker et al., 1979)- This is a 25 item questionnaire designed to measure young people’s assessments of parental care and psychological control. It comprises 12 “care” items and 13 “over-protection” items with a claimed test–retest reliability of 0.76 for the “care” scale and 0.63 for the “over-protection” scale (Parker et al., 1979). The subjects were instructed to reply to all the items on a retrospective basis that is on the basis of their impressions acquired about their parents in first 16 years of their life. 6. GHQ-28 (Goldberg and Hiller, 1979) - GHQ-28 was designed to be a self-administered scoring test aimed at detecting psychiatric disorders among respondents. The Questionnaire was designed to be easy to administer, acceptable to respondents, fairly short and objective in the sense that it did not require the person administering it to make subjective assessment about respondents.GHQ-28 containing 28 items is derived from further analysis of GHQ-60 and consists of 4 sub-scales for somatic, anxiety and insomnia; social dysfunction and severe depression. Threshold for care identification was taken as 4/5, i.e., score 4 significant a nonpsychiatric case and 5-significant psychiatric case. Total score range, from 0 to 28. Its split half reliability is 0.97. Procedure Each participant was contacted individually and was clearly informed about the purpose of the study. After establishing the rapport with the individual participant he/she was asked to fill up the questionnaires and ensured that the responses would be kept confidential. Before collection of data, oral consent from each subject was taken. Results and Discussion Considering the objectives of the present study Product Moment Correlation has been computed to find out the relationship of happiness with perceived parental rearing style, attributional style, personality traits and stressful life events. The result has been presented in the following table. Table 1 – Correlation of Happiness with other psychological variables Variable r Perceived Parental Rearing Style .37* .06 .53** ‐.25 .43** ‐.27 .46** Care by Father Overprotection by Father Care by Mother Overprotection By Mother Attributional Style Positive Attributional Style Negative Attributional Style Composite positive and negative attributional style Personality Neuroticism Traits Extraversion Openness Agreeableness Conscientiousness Stressful life events Stressful life events *P>.05 ; **P>.01 ‐.52** .66** .51** .08 .28 ‐.24 Table 1 shows that perceived parental care (both parents); positive attributional style, neuroticism, extraversion and openness to experience- all these were significantly correlated with happiness. If happiness is considered synonymous with wellbeing, the present study supports the findings of Herz and Gullone (1999) that quality of the parent–child relationship has a significant impact on the long-term well-being of individuals. Perceived care from father and mother in childhood years could be assumed to have a contributory effect on adult happiness. The present study shows that, the positive attributional style, which is assuming the cause of a Psychological Correlates of Happiness 63 positive event as one’s own credit, stability in assuming this causes as one’s own responsibility and globality of this positive attributional style is significantly related to happiness(Cheng and Furnham,2001). Although not statistically significant, but the opposite, that is negative attributional style; taking the responsibility of failure and bad events to one’s own shoulder would contribute to unhappiness and depression. A number of studies have found a positive relationship of happiness with extraversion, and a negative outcome when it was correlated with neuroticism (Furnham and Brewin, 1990). As extraversion leads to enjoyment and participation in social activities, it can be assumed that extravert people are happier because they can share their inner feelings to others and can redirect their mind to different channels rather than only concentrating on their negative experiences. The probability and severity of major life events may be influenced by life course and socioeconomic position and further research is needed to study such influences. It can be argued that there is a relationship between subjective happiness and inequalities and in this context the degree, to which there are inequalities in the probabilities of major life events to occur to different social groups would mirror a similar inequality in the distribution of happiness. Finally, the ability of people to adjust to new circumstances through adaptation processes may also affect their responsiveness to different life events (Heady and Wearing,1989). Although in the present study the relationship between stressful life events and happiness is not statistically significant, may be due to the size of the sample, but it is evident that stress bears a negative relationship with happiness. The present study demonstrates the importance of parental care (especially mother’s) in childhood for becoming a happy adult. Positive Attributional style, also, has been found to be contributory to happiness. The present study supports the fact that neuroticism lowers happiness; whereas people, who are extravert and open to experience, are happier than others. References Abramson, L. Y., M. E. P. Seligman & J. Teasdale. (1978). Learned helplessness in humans: Critique and reformulation. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 87, pp. 49–74. Argyle, M., M. Martin & J. Crossland. (1989). Happiness as a function of personality and social encounters, in J. Forgas and J. Innes (eds.), Recent Advances insocial psychology: An international perspective. 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