Measuring Happiness

Measuring Happiness
Author: Joachim Weimann
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 223
Release: 2015-02-06
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0262028441

Can money buy happiness? Is income a reliable measure for life satisfaction? In this book, three economists explore the happiness-prosperity connection, investigating how economists measure life satisfaction and well-being. --

Subjective Well-Being

Subjective Well-Being
Author: Panel on Measuring Subjective Well-Being in a Policy-Relevant Framework
Publisher: National Academies Press
Total Pages: 148
Release: 2014-01-01
Genre: Mathematics
ISBN: 0309294479

Subjective well-being refers to how people experience and evaluate their lives and specific domains and activities in their lives. This information has already proven valuable to researchers, who have produced insights about the emotional states and experiences of people belonging to different groups, engaged in different activities, at different points in the life course, and involved in different family and community structures. Research has also revealed relationships between people's self-reported, subjectively assessed states and their behavior and decisions. Research on subjective well-being has been ongoing for decades, providing new information about the human condition. During the past decade, interest in the topic among policy makers, national statistical offices, academic researchers, the media, and the public has increased markedly because of its potential for shedding light on the economic, social, and health conditions of populations and for informing policy decisions across these domains. Subjective Well-Being: Measuring Happiness, Suffering, and Other Dimensions of Experience explores the use of this measure in population surveys. This report reviews the current state of research and evaluates methods for the measurement. In this report, a range of potential experienced well-being data applications are cited, from cost-benefit studies of health care delivery to commuting and transportation planning, environmental valuation, and outdoor recreation resource monitoring, and even to assessment of end-of-life treatment options. Subjective Well-Being finds that, whether used to assess the consequence of people's situations and policies that might affect them or to explore determinants of outcomes, contextual and covariate data are needed alongside the subjective well-being measures. This report offers guidance about adopting subjective well-being measures in official government surveys to inform social and economic policies and considers whether research has advanced to a point which warrants the federal government collecting data that allow aspects of the population's subjective well-being to be tracked and associated with changing conditions.

A Measure of Happiness

A Measure of Happiness
Author: Lorrie Thomson
Publisher: Kensington Books
Total Pages: 352
Release: 2015-08-25
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 075829333X

Katherine Lamontagne isn't Celeste Barnes's mother, but ever since Celeste graduated high school and her parents abandoned Hidden Harbor, Maine, she's acted the part. At twenty-two, Celeste worked at Katherine’s bakery, and hoped to buy the business once Katherine took early retirement. But when Katherine reconsidered that decision, Celeste fled to culinary school in New York—only to return two months later, a shadow of the girl who’d stormed out the door. Katherine knows the signs of secret heartbreak. Years ago, she gave up her baby son for adoption—a regret she’s never shared with either her ex-husband or Celeste. She longs for Celeste to confide in her now. But it will be a stranger in town—an engaging young wanderer named Zach Fitzgerald—who spurs them toward healing. As both women are drawn into Zach’s questioning heart, they also rediscover their own appetites for truth and for love—and gain the courage to face the past without being imprisoned by it. Uplifting, emotionally rich, and deeply satisfying, A Measure of Happiness illuminates the nature of friendship, motherhood, hope—and the gifts of second chances. Advance Praise “In this absorbing, emotional novel about family secrets, Lorrie Thomson demonstrates that having the courage to open our hearts to love is the true measure of happiness.” --Holly Robinson, author of Beach Plum Island and Haven Lake “A Measure of Happiness is about many things – finding home, facing fears, and making choices among them. But more than anything, it’s the book you’ll reach for when you want to recall that perfect love can still be found in an imperfect world.” – Therese Walsh, author of The Moon Sisters

The Happiness Equation

The Happiness Equation
Author: Nick Powdthavee
Publisher: Icon Books Ltd
Total Pages: 264
Release: 2010-08-05
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1848312245

Why is marriage worth £200,000 a year? Why will having children make you unhappy? Why does happiness from winning the lottery take two years to arrive? Why does time heal the pain of divorce or the death of a loved one – but not unemployment? Everybody wants to be happy. But how much happiness – precisely – will each life choice bring? Should I get married? Am I really going to feel happy about the career that I picked? How can we decide not only which choice is better for us, but how much it's better for us? The result of new, unique research, The Happiness Equation brings to a general readership for the first time the new science of happiness economics. It describes how we can measure emotional reactions to different life experiences and present them in ways we can relate to. How, for instance, monetary values can be put on things that can't be bought or sold in the market – such as marriage, friendship, even death – so that we can objectively rank them in order of preference. It also explains why some things matter more to our happiness than others (like why seeing friends is worth more than a Ferrari) while others are worth almost nothing (like sunny weather). Nick Powdthavee – whose work on happiness has been discussed on both the Undercover Economist and Freakanomics blogs – brings cutting-edge research on how we value our happiness to a general audience, with a style that wears its learning lightly and is a joy to read.

Authentic Happiness

Authentic Happiness
Author: Martin Seligman
Publisher: Hachette UK
Total Pages: 306
Release: 2011-01-11
Genre: Self-Help
ISBN: 1857884132

In this important, entertaining book, one of the world's most celebrated psychologists, Martin Seligman, asserts that happiness can be learned and cultivated, and that everyone has the power to inject real joy into their lives. In Authentic Happiness, he describes the 24 strengths and virtues unique to the human psyche. Each of us, it seems, has at least five of these attributes, and can build on them to identify and develop to our maximum potential. By incorporating these strengths - which include kindness, originality, humour, optimism, curiosity, enthusiasm and generosity -- into our everyday lives, he tells us, we can reach new levels of optimism, happiness and productivity. Authentic Happiness provides a variety of tests and unique assessment tools to enable readers to discover and deploy those strengths at work, in love and in raising children. By accessing the very best in ourselves, we can improve the world around us and achieve new and lasting levels of authentic contentment and joy.

The Origins of Happiness

The Origins of Happiness
Author: Andrew E. Clark
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 338
Release: 2019-08-27
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0691196958

A new perspective on life satisfaction and well-being over the life course What makes people happy? The Origins of Happiness seeks to revolutionize how we think about human priorities and to promote public policy changes that are based on what really matters to people. Drawing on a range of evidence using large-scale data from various countries, the authors consider the key factors that affect human well-being, including income, education, employment, family conflict, health, childcare, and crime. The Origins of Happiness offers a groundbreaking new vision for how we might become more healthy, happy, and whole.

How Will You Measure Your Life? (Harvard Business Review Classics)

How Will You Measure Your Life? (Harvard Business Review Classics)
Author: Clayton M. Christensen
Publisher: Harvard Business Review Press
Total Pages: 28
Release: 2017-01-17
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1633692574

In the spring of 2010, Harvard Business School’s graduating class asked HBS professor Clay Christensen to address them—but not on how to apply his principles and thinking to their post-HBS careers. The students wanted to know how to apply his wisdom to their personal lives. He shared with them a set of guidelines that have helped him find meaning in his own life, which led to this now-classic article. Although Christensen’s thinking is rooted in his deep religious faith, these are strategies anyone can use. Since 1922, Harvard Business Review has been a leading source of breakthrough ideas in management practice. The Harvard Business Review Classics series now offers you the opportunity to make these seminal pieces a part of your permanent management library. Each highly readable volume contains a groundbreaking idea that continues to shape best practices and inspire countless managers around the world.

Happiness in Children

Happiness in Children
Author: Mark D Holder
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 91
Release: 2012-04-05
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 9400744145

This briefs summarizes the research on positive well-being in children, with a particular focus on their happiness. It starts with a discussion of the constructs of positive psychology (i.e., well-being, happiness and life satisfaction), and then outlines the research that shows the importance of studying well-being. Next, it explores how researchers measure happiness and what these measures tell us about whether children are happy and how their happiness differs from adults. Following this, it discusses current positive psychology theories with the aim of suggesting their promise in understanding children’s well-being. Next, it examines the importance of individual differences, including culture and temperament. Because studies have only recently identified several of the factors associated with children’s happiness, the book ends with a discussion of how we might enhance children’s well-being and suggests directions for future research.

OECD Guidelines on Measuring Subjective Well-being

OECD Guidelines on Measuring Subjective Well-being
Author: OECD
Publisher: OECD Publishing
Total Pages: 270
Release: 2013-03-20
Genre:
ISBN: 9264191658

These Guidelines represent the first attempt to provide international recommendations on collecting, publishing, and analysing subjective well-being data.

The Blue Zones of Happiness

The Blue Zones of Happiness
Author: Dan Buettner
Publisher: National Geographic Books
Total Pages: 289
Release: 2017-10-03
Genre: Self-Help
ISBN: 1426218494

New York Times best-selling author Dan Buettner reveals the surprising secrets of what makes the world's happiest places—and shows you how to apply these lessons to your own life. In this inspiring guide, you’ll find game-changing tools drawn from global research and expert insights for achieving maximum fulfillment. Along the way, you'll: • Discover the three strands of happiness—pleasure, purpose, and pride—that feature prominently in the world's happiest places. • Take the specially designed Blue Zones Happiness Test to pinpoint areas in your life where you could cultivate greater joy, deeper meaning, and increased satisfaction. • Meet the world's Happiness All-Stars: inspiring individuals from Denmark to the United States who reveal dynamic, practical ways to improve day-to-day living. • Discover specific, science-based strategies for setting up a “life radius” of community, work, home, and self to create healthier, happiness-boosting habits for the long-term.