People think that money affects happiness more than it really does

With dogged determination we lie, rob, borrow, adventure and sometimes work too, in the hope of boosting our income. So zealous is our pursuit of money, it's as if we think it will someways make us happier. Strangely enough, whilst psychologists and economists have conducted numerous studies display that the relation between income and healthiness is weak, only digit preceding study has asked what place grouping rattling believe about money and healthiness (and this was focused on middle-income, working women). It's into this empirical desert that Lara Aknin and colleagues arrive with a survey of hundreds of North Americans of mixed age, sexuality and wealth. Aknin's team have found that grouping do indeed appraisal the unification between money and happiness, especially at lower levels of income.

The study worked by asking grouping what their own income and healthiness levels were and then asking them to judge the healthiness of grouping on lower or higher incomes than themselves. The participants' estimates of the healthiness of grouping on high incomes was largely accurate, but they massively underestimated the healthiness of grouping on lower incomes. The picture was the same in a second study that asked grouping to judge how happy they'd be if they earned more or inferior than they rattling did.

More detailed analysis showed that grouping on higher incomes were more probable to appraisal the relation between money and happiness, perhaps because they had more to fear from losing the ability to maintain their underway standard of living.

\"We demonstrate that grown Americans erroneously believe that earning inferior than the median household income is associated with severely diminished happiness,\" the researchers said. \"[This is] a false belief that may advance some grouping to chase opportunities for accumulated wealth or forgo a reduction in income for accumulated free time.\"

_________________________________

Aknin, L., Norton, M., & Dunn, E. (2009). From wealth to well-being? Money matters, but less than people think The Journal of Positive Psychology, 4 (6), 523-527 DOI: