The pursuit of happiness: who is happy--and why

Abstract

A highly readable synthesis of social psychological findings related to the issue of happiness. Chapters treat differences in happiness levels--how happiness fails to vary across the societal spectrum, how it is correlated with various personality traits, and how it relates to patterns of relationship. There are also sections on how people can make themselves happy and/or be made happy through various forms of mental manipulation. Although light and engaging in style, there is little in the book to unsettle common beliefs, and in this sense, the book is unstimulating. The volume is also vulnerable to the criticism that countless studies of people's declarations of happiness, along with the causes and effects of these declarations, is insufficient. Without any attention to the problem of what happiness is--its basic nature--one is unclear about the object of all the analysis. Undergraduates; general.