Some Individual Differences Influencing the Propensity to Happiness: Insights from Behavioral Economics

Fei He (), Hao Guan, Yi Kong, Rong Cao and Jiaxi Peng ()

Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, 2014, vol. 119, issue 2, 897-908

Abstract: The present study investigated the differences between individuals with high and low level of happiness in regulatory focus, reference point setting and editing rules conformity. Participants (N = 570) responded to the general well-being (GWB) schedule. Those with GWB scores ±1 Z score from the sample mean (N = 182) were recalled to respond to the regular focus scale and self-frame questionnaire, and complete the editing rules test. The results suggested that compared to the individuals with low happiness, individuals with high happiness tend to be promotion focus rather than prevention focus, prefer to regard the current state as reference point, and more comply with editing rules that can produce the maximum psychological value. The current result further illustrated the subjectivity of happiness and suggested some practical ways to achieving more happiness. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2014

Keywords: Subjective happiness; Regulatory focus theory; Self framing; Editing rules (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s11205-013-0519-0 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:soinre:v:119:y:2014:i:2:p:897-908

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/11135

DOI: 10.1007/s11205-013-0519-0

Access Statistics for this article

Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement is currently edited by Filomena Maggino

More articles in Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().