The Adaptable Mind — Happiness 7 (C1)

HAPPINESS · LESSON 7

The Adaptable Mind

C1 (B2–C2) · 90 minutes

One year later

Task Alone: each person below rated their life 7 out of 10 just before the event (0 = the worst possible life for them, 10 = the best). Write the number you think each will give one year later, and again five years later. In pairs: compare your numbers. Where did you differ most, and why?

1 year

5 years

1. Aiyana, a nurse in Winnipeg, wins a lottery prize worth about ten years' salary.

2. Kofi, a student in Accra, is left by his partner of two years.

3. Xiu, an accountant in Harbin, moves to a sunny coastal city for a similar job.

4. Dmitri, a builder in Tbilisi, loses his job and is out of work for a year.

5. Lucía, a graphic designer in Montevideo, has a spinal-cord injury in a cycling accident and now uses a wheelchair.

6. Hiroshi, a researcher in Osaka, is turned down for the permanent post he spent six years working towards.

Claim 2 on trial

Task Write a letter for each claim. Claim 1 is claim 2 from Lesson 1: has your grade changed since then?

S Strong

M Mixed

W Weak

F Failed

1. Lottery winners end up no happier than before.

2. Most people fully recover from bad life events within a few years.

3. People overestimate how long bad news will upset them.

4. We remember painful experiences mainly by their worst and final moments.

READING

The hedonic treadmill

In 1971 the psychologists Philip Brickman and Donald Campbell argued that people judge their circumstances against an adaptation level: whatever they have grown used to. A pay rise pleases, then becomes normal. They called this the hedonic treadmill: we keep running towards better circumstances and stay in the same place.

In 1978 Brickman, Dan Coates and Ronnie Janoff-Bulman made the idea famous. They interviewed 22 people who had won $50,000 or more in the Illinois State Lottery, 22 people from the same areas, and 29 people paralysed in accidents, all patients at a rehabilitation institute. On a 0 to 5 happiness scale, the winners averaged 4.00 and the comparison group 3.82, a difference

too small to be significant, and the winners enjoyed everyday things, such as breakfast or a compliment, less. The accident group averaged 2.96: significantly lower, though above the middle of the scale.

The study is often retold as "lottery winners and people with paralysis end up equally happy". It showed no such thing. Nobody was measured before and after: each group was interviewed once, the injured while still in rehabilitation. The samples were tiny, nearly half the winners approached declined, and the injured were interviewed face to face, the others by phone. It was a snapshot, not a test of adaptation.

READING

Thirty years on

Task In pairs, look again at your letter for claim 1 on "Claim 2 on trial". Would you change it now? Agree one sentence of evidence that supports your grade.

The most rigorous lottery study so far comes from Sweden. Erik Lindqvist, Robert Östling and David Cesarini (2020) surveyed 3,362 lottery players 5 to 22 years after a win. Prizes fall by chance, so comparing big winners with similar players who won little isolates the effect of the money, and the analyses were registered in advance. Big winners were more satisfied with

their lives, by about 0.037 standard deviations per $100,000 won after tax, mainly through satisfaction with their finances, with no sign of fading. Effects on happiness and mental health were smaller and could not be told apart from zero. A British study of medium-sized wins (Gardner and Oswald, 2007) found better mental health two years on.

READING · CONTINUED

Thirty years on

For bad events, Richard Lucas and colleagues followed tens of thousands of Germans and Britons for years. Their set points were not fixed. On average, widows and widowers returned close to their earlier life satisfaction, but only after several years. People who lost their jobs did not fully recover, even after finding work again. People who developed a long-term disability reported lasting drops on average,

though another analysis of British data (Oswald and Powdthavee, 2008) estimated a recovery of 30 to 50 per cent of the drop, depending on severity. Individuals differed widely.

In 2006 Ed Diener, Lucas and Christie Napa Scollon summed up: adaptation is real but often incomplete, people adapt differently, and set points can move.

What the evidence says

Claim 2: Lottery winners end up no happier than before.

S Strong

M Mixed

W Weak

F Failed

The claim rests on a 1978 snapshot of 22 winners, with no before-and-after measure. The strongest later test, a pre-registered Swedish study of 3,362 players (Lindqvist, Östling and Cesarini, 2020), found large winners more satisfied with their lives 5 to 22 years on, with no sign of fading, and a British panel study found better mental health two years after medium-sized wins (Gardner and Oswald, 2007). The grain of truth: the gain is modest, and it shows in how people judge their lives more than in day-to-day happiness, where the Swedish effects were too small to detect.

READING

Getting the future wrong

Do we foresee our own adaptation? That is a question of affective forecasting, predicting our own feelings, studied above all by Daniel Gilbert and Timothy Wilson. Their central finding is the impact bias: we overestimate how strongly, and for how long, events will affect us.

In a 1998 study, University of Texas students who had never had a romantic break-up predicted their happiness two months after one: 3.89 on a 1 to 7 scale. Students who had broken up in the past two months reported 5.42, about the same as those who never had (5.27). In a second study, assistant professors predicted five less happy years after being denied tenure; former colleagues who had been denied it were not significantly less happy than those promoted,

though only 20 replied. Gilbert's explanation is immune neglect: we forget that our minds will soften bad news by reframing it and moving on.

A second error is the focusing illusion. David Schkade and Daniel Kahneman (1998) surveyed 1,993 students in the American Midwest and Southern California. Both groups were equally satisfied with their lives, yet both expected Californians to be happier: imagining California, people focused on the climate; judging their own lives, they did not.

How large the impact bias is remains debated: Linda Levine and colleagues (2012) traced much of it to the way questions are asked, and Wilson and Gilbert disputed this. Even Levine's team accepted that people often overestimate how long feelings last.

One year later: what the research suggests

1. Aiyana

In Sweden, large winners were more satisfied with their lives 5 to 22 years later; their day-to-day happiness changed little (Lindqvist and colleagues, 2020).

2. Kofi

Students forecast that a break-up would leave them much less happy; those who had been through one recently were as happy as those who had not (Gilbert and colleagues, 1998).

3. Xiu

Students in the Midwest and in California were equally satisfied with life, though both groups expected Californians to be happier (Schkade and Kahneman, 1998).

4. Dmitri

In German panel data, people who lost their jobs recovered only partly, even after finding work again (Lucas and colleagues, 2004).

One year later: what the research suggests

On average, life satisfaction falls when a long-term disability begins and recovers partly, with wide differences between people (Lucas, 2007; Oswald and Powdthavee, 2008). Outsiders tend to expect worse: in one study, kidney-dialysis patients' moods through the day were about as good as healthy people's, yet healthy people did not foresee this (Riis and colleagues, 2005).

5. Lucía

6. Hiroshi

Professors denied tenure were not significantly less happy than those promoted, against what their colleagues forecast, though the sample was small (Gilbert and colleagues, 1998).

The pattern: people tend to predict bigger and longer reactions than they have. For some events, such as unemployment, adaptation is on average incomplete.

READING

Two selves

Kahneman later drew a sharper line. The experiencing self lives each moment: is this pleasant or painful now? The remembering self keeps score afterwards, tells the story and makes the choices. The two do not always agree.

In a 1993 experiment, 32 students held one hand in water at 14 degrees Celsius for 60 seconds. In another trial they held the other hand in the same water for 60 seconds, then 30 seconds more as it warmed to about 15 degrees: still painful, but less so.

READING · CONTINUED

Two selves

The long trial held all the pain of the short one, and more. Yet 22 of the 32 chose to repeat it.

In hospital, Donald Redelmeier and Kahneman (1996) recorded the pain of 154 colonoscopy patients minute by minute. Their memories tracked the worst moment and the last, and barely reflected how long the procedure lasted: the peak–end rule and duration neglect. In a 2003 trial with 682 patients, half had up to

three minutes added at the end, with the instrument held still. They remembered the procedure as less unpleasant and, allowing for other factors, were slightly more likely to return for a repeat colonoscopy.

In this module's terms, the experiencing self speaks for Pleasure; the remembering self makes the life judgement that a 0 to 10 rating asks for.

Two selves

Pleasure

Desire

Flourishing

How does your life feel?

Are you getting what you want?

Is your life going well?

hedonism

desire theories

objective-list theories

Experiencing self: Pleasure, moment by moment

Remembering self: the life judgement

Living with change (cards 1–3)

Task Groups of 3 or 4. For each card, write A (adaptation), F (forecasting error: impact bias or focusing illusion) or P (peak–end); some cards have two. Then mark each card 1–5 for "Knowing this idea would help here", and agree which card the research helps least.

1 strongly agree · 2 mostly agree · 3 on the fence · 4 mostly disagree · 5 strongly disagree

A / F / P

1–5

1. The pay rise Priya, an engineer in Bengaluru, gets a 30% pay rise. She plans to spend all of it on a bigger flat, a new car and better restaurants, "so that every day feels like a reward".

2. The sunshine plan Jonas, a teacher in Oslo, has spent three dark winters planning a move to Lisbon. "I'll be a different person in the sun," he tells friends. He has no job lined up there and knows nobody.

3. The exam Yuki, a medical student in Sapporo, is sure that if she fails her licensing exam she will "never get over it". If she fails, she can sit it again in six months.

Living with change (cards 4–6)

A = adaptation · F = forecasting error: impact bias or focusing illusion · P = peak–end

1 strongly agree · 2 mostly agree · 3 on the fence · 4 mostly disagree · 5 strongly disagree

A / F / P

1–5

4. The last day Amara and Jabari, from Nairobi, spend ten good days travelling in Vietnam. On the last day they miss their flight and sleep at the airport. A month later, they describe the whole holiday as "a disaster".

5. The gentle ending At a clinic in Monterrey, Dr Salazar wonders whether to end painful wound dressings slowly, with a few extra minutes of milder discomfort, so that patients remember them as less bad. It adds a little pain to every session.

6. The court case After a workplace accident, Thiago, a welder in São Paulo, has a spinal-cord injury and now uses a wheelchair. His employer's lawyer argues that people adapt, so the compensation should be lower. Thiago's lawyer replies that compensation should reflect what was lost, not how well he copes.

Which self should we listen to?

Task In pairs, discuss at least three of the questions. For each one, note whether you were thinking of the experiencing self or the remembering self.

1. If we adapt to most good things, why work hard for a better life at all?

2. Is getting used to good things a design flaw, or a protection?

3. Should a doctor add a little pain to leave a better memory?

4. Should governments aim to improve how days feel, or how people judge their lives?

5. Is it wise to plan a holiday for the memories rather than for the days?

6. Where you live, do people expect money or success to change life more than it does?

Private reflection

Task Choose one prompt and write privately. Nobody will read what you write. Sharing afterwards is optional.

Prompt 1

Think of a change someone you know dreaded or longed for. Did it turn out as big as they expected? What did they not foresee?

Prompt 2 (lighter)

Think of a film, trip or meal remembered mostly for its ending. Was the memory fair to the whole experience?

Before Lesson 8

This week, catch one prediction about feelings: "I'll love it", "I'll never get over it". Write it down, and check it later.

Pleasure

It can be yours or overheard: a purchase, a match, a move, an exam. When you check, ask whether the prediction overestimated, underestimated or got it right, and what it focused on.

Desire

Flourishing

Next lesson: Other People. Are close relationships the biggest thing in a happy life, and has social media made teenagers unhappier?

TEACHER'S REFERENCE · SKIP OR DELETE BEFORE CLASS

Answer key (1)

CLAIM 2 ON TRIAL

1 F. See "What the evidence says".

2 M. On average, people do adapt to some bad events, such as widowhood, but only over several years, and not fully to others, such as unemployment and long-term disability (Lucas and colleagues; Diener, Lucas and Scollon, 2006). Individual differences are large. "Most people fully recover within a few years" overstates it.

3 S. Found across many studies, from break-ups and tenure (Gilbert and colleagues, 1998) onwards. Levine and colleagues (2012) dispute how large the error in intensity is, but accept that people overestimate how long feelings last.

4 S. A 2022 meta-analysis of 174 effect sizes (Alaybek and colleagues, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes) found a large peak–end effect on overall evaluations (r = 0.58) and almost no effect of duration. One caveat: the average across the whole experience predicted evaluations about as well.

TEACHER'S REFERENCE · SKIP OR DELETE BEFORE CLASS

Answer key (2)

LIVING WITH CHANGE suggested; the 1–5 marks are opinions

1 A. The treadmill: the flat, car and restaurants become normal. The Swedish evidence suggests money still raises life satisfaction, so the idea is a caution, not a reason to refuse the rise.

2 F (focusing illusion), with A: the weather is the feature he notices; work, friends and money will decide most of his days.

3 F (impact bias, immune neglect): she probably overestimates how long the disappointment would last.

4 P. The ending dominates the memory of ten good days.

5 P. The 2003 colonoscopy trial in miniature. The ethical question is whose judgement counts: the experiencing self (less pain) or the remembering self (a better memory).

6 A, with F on the employer's side. Oswald and Powdthavee (2008) raised this question for judges. Adaptation to long-term disability is on average partial and varies widely, and many argue compensation is for what was lost, not for feelings.