''The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom'' is a 2006 book written by American

social psychologist Social psychology is the methodical study of how thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of others. Although studying many of the same substantive topics as its counterpart in the field of ...

Jonathan Haidt Jonathan David Haidt (; born October 19, 1963) is an American social psychologist and author. He is the Thomas Cooley Professor of Ethical Leadership at the New York University Stern School of Business. Haidt's main areas of study are the psyc ...

. In it, Haidt poses several "Great Ideas" on happiness espoused by thinkers of the past—such as

Plato Plato ( ; Greek language, Greek: , ; born BC, died 348/347 BC) was an ancient Greek philosopher of the Classical Greece, Classical period who is considered a foundational thinker in Western philosophy and an innovator of the writte ...

Buddha Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha (),* * * was a wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism. According to Buddhist legends, he was ...

and

Jesus Jesus (AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, and many Names and titles of Jesus in the New Testament, other names and titles, was a 1st-century Jewish preacher and religious leader. He is the Jesus in Chris ...

—and examines them in the light of contemporary psychological research, extracting from them any lessons that still apply to our modern lives. Central to the book are the concepts of virtue,

happiness Happiness is a complex and multifaceted emotion that encompasses a range of positive feelings, from contentment to intense joy. It is often associated with positive life experiences, such as achieving goals, spending time with loved ones, ...

, fulfillment, and meaning.

Summary of chapters

The introduction first explains that the author's goal is to reduce the infinite 'wisdom' accessible to modern people into 10 great ideas, one per chapter. The remainder of the Introduction provides a concise preview of those ten chapters as follows. The first chapter describes how each person has two parts: the primitive part, which includes our basic instincts; and the highly evolved part, which tries to control the instincts. This effort to control our instincts is shown in chapter two to tend to cause us too much worry, but various techniques, such as meditation, might be employed to detach the worrier from his worries. The third chapter goes to the relationship of the individual to other individuals by beginning with the

Golden Rule The Golden Rule is the principle of treating others as one would want to be treated by them. It is sometimes called an ethics of reciprocity, meaning that one should reciprocate to others how one would like them to treat the person (not neces ...

of doing unto others as you would have them do unto you. This leads in the fourth chapter to a description of the tendency that people have of seeing faults in others more readily than in themselves, which by simply realizing we might go to some length to rectify and thus come closer to living by the Golden Rule. By the fifth chapter, at the halfway point of the book, Haidt introduces the notion of the Happiness Hypothesis. The Happiness Hypothesis could be that happiness comes from within, as

said, or could be that happiness comes from outside. Haidt argues in Chapter Six that the truth might lie between the two extremes and contends that love depends on more than the self and is crucial to happiness. The seventh chapter asks whether adversity is essential to happiness and provides a nuanced answer which is that it depends on your stage in life. Achieving happiness is a complex process which includes acting virtuously, and Haidt claims in chapter eight that behaving virtuously means to do as

Aristotle Aristotle (; 384–322 BC) was an Ancient Greek philosophy, Ancient Greek philosopher and polymath. His writings cover a broad range of subjects spanning the natural sciences, philosophy, linguistics, economics, politics, psychology, a ...

said and to develop your strengths and realize your native potential. Chapter nine extends the idea that a person's happiness benefits from living virtuously by noting that some feeling of divinity helps where divinity comes through a life-long practice of moral actions. Chapter ten takes this idea of a life-long practice yet further and contends that a happy life is one where you get the relationships right between yourself and others, yourself and your work, and between your work and something larger than yourself—you feel a sense of purpose.

Ch.1: The divided self

Haidt looks at a number of ways of dividing the self that have existed since ancient times: *mind vs. body *left brain vs. right brain ( lateralisation of brain function) *old brain vs. new brain (

frontal cortex The frontal lobe is the largest of the four major lobes of the brain in mammals, and is located at the front of each cerebral hemisphere (in front of the parietal lobe and the temporal lobe). It is parted from the parietal lobe by a groove betw ...

) *controlled vs. automatic Haidt focuses on this last division, between the conscious/reasoned processes and automatic/implicit processes. His metaphor is a rider on the back of an elephant in which the conscious mind is the rider and the unconscious mind is the elephant. The rider is unable to control the elephant by force: this explains many puzzles about our mental life, particularly why we have such trouble with weakness of will. Learning how to train the elephant is the secret of self-improvement.

Ch.2: Changing your mind

The automatic emotional reactions of the "elephant" (affective

priming Priming may refer to: * Priming (agriculture), a form of seed planting preparation, in which seeds are soaked before planting * Priming (immunology), a process occurring when a specific antigen is presented to naive lymphocytes causing them to d ...

) guide us throughout our lives. People even tend to choose mates, and professions, whose names resemble their own. Though there is a bias towards negativity, some people are optimists and others pessimists. Haidt discusses three ways of changing those automatic reactions: (1)

meditation Meditation is a practice in which an individual uses a technique to train attention and awareness and detach from reflexive, "discursive thinking", achieving a mentally clear and emotionally calm and stable state, while not judging the meditat ...

, (2)

cognitive therapy Cognitive therapy (CT) is a psychotherapeutic approach developed by American psychiatrist Aaron T. Beck, which aims to change unhelpful or inaccurate thought patterns. CT is one therapeutic approach within the larger group of cognitive behavio ...

, and (3)

SSRI Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are a class of drugs that are typically used as antidepressants in the treatment of major depressive disorder, anxiety disorders, and other psychological conditions. SSRIs primarily work by ...

medications such as

Prozac Fluoxetine, sold under the brand name Prozac, among others, is an antidepressant medication of the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) class used for the treatment of major depressive disorder, anxiety, obsessive–compulsive disor ...

Ch.3: Reciprocity with a vengeance

Many species have a social life, but among mammals, only humans in particular are ultra-social—able to live in very large cooperative groups.

The Golden Rule The Golden Rule is the principle of treating others as one would want to be treated by them. It is sometimes called an ethics of reciprocity, meaning that one should reciprocate to others how one would like them to treat the person (not neces ...

, supplemented with gossip, is the secret of our success. Calling on

Robert Cialdini Robert Beno Cialdini (born April 27, 1945) is an American psychologist and author. He is the Regents' Professor Emeritus of Psychology and Marketing at Arizona State University and was a visiting professor of marketing, business and psychology ...

's "six weapons of influence," Haidt describes ways in which understanding the deep workings of reciprocity can help to solve problems in our social lives and guard against the many ways that we can be manipulated.

Ch.4: The faults of others

Part of our ultra-sociality is that we are constantly trying to manipulate others' perceptions of ourselves, without realizing that we are doing so. As Jesus said, we see the faults of others clearly, but are blind to our own. ( "Why do you see the speck in your neighbour's eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye?") Haidt looks at what

social psychology Social psychology is the methodical study of how thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of others. Although studying many of the same substantive topics as its counterpart in the field ...

has to say about this, beginning with the work of

Daniel Batson Charles Daniel Batson (born March 15, 1943) is an American social psychologist. He has two doctoral degrees, in theology (from Princeton Theological Seminary) and psychology (from Princeton University's Department of Psychology). Batson obtain ...

on cheating and self-justification, mentioning Robert Wright's description of our "constitutional ignorance" of hypocrisy'' in The Moral Animal'', and moving on to work by

Deanna Kuhn Deanna Zipse Kuhn (born 1944) is an American psychologist. She is Professor of Psychology and Education at Columbia University. She is known for contributions to the psychology of science – the scientific study of scientific thought and behavi ...

and David Perkins on

confirmation bias Confirmation bias (also confirmatory bias, myside bias, or congeniality bias) is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor and recall information in a way that confirms or supports one's prior beliefs or Value (ethics and social sciences), val ...

and

Roy Baumeister Roy Frederick Baumeister (; born May 16, 1953) is an American social psychologist who is known for his work on the self, social rejection, belongingness, sexuality and sex differences, self-control, self-esteem, self-defeating behaviors, ...

's work on "The Myth of Pure Evil." Haidt then discusses ways of taking off "the moral glasses" and seeing the world as it really is.

Ch.5: The pursuit of happiness

It is a common idea that happiness comes from within and can't be found in external things. For a while in the 1990s, psychologists agreed with ancient sages (such as Buddha and

Epictetus Epictetus (, ; , ''Epíktētos''; 50 135 AD) was a Greek Stoic philosopher. He was born into slavery at Hierapolis, Phrygia (present-day Pamukkale, in western Turkey) and lived in Rome until his banishment, when he went to Nicopolis in ...

) that external conditions are not what matter. However, Haidt argues that we now know that some external circumstances do matter. He identifies ways of improving happiness by altering these, including spending money well, and argues that the Western emphasis on action and striving is not without merit.

Ch.6: Love and attachments

There are many kinds of love, but, Haidt asserts, they all begin to make sense when you see where love comes from, and what it does. To do this he examines

John Bowlby Edward John Mostyn Bowlby (; 26 February 1907 – 2 September 1990) was a British psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, notable for his interest in child development and for his pioneering work in attachment theory. A ''Review of General Psychology'' ...

World Health Organization The World Health Organization (WHO) is a list of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations which coordinates responses to international public health issues and emergencies. It is headquartered in Gen ...

-sponsored study and report, "Maternal Care and Mental Health" in 1950, and the subsequent work with monkeys by

Harry Harlow Harry Frederick Harlow (October 31, 1905 – December 6, 1981) was an American psychologist best known for his maternal-separation, dependency needs, and social isolation experiments on rhesus monkeys, which manifested the importance of caregivi ...

. Understanding the different kinds of love, he writes, can help explain why people make so many mistakes with love, and why philosophers hate love and give us bad advice about it.

Ch.7: The uses of adversity

Nietzsche Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher. He began his career as a classical philologist, turning to philosophy early in his academic career. In 1869, aged 24, Nietzsche became the youngest pro ...

wrote, "What doesn't kill me makes me stronger," but this is not true for everyone; adversity may result in

post-traumatic stress disorder Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a mental disorder that develops from experiencing a Psychological trauma, traumatic event, such as sexual assault, domestic violence, child abuse, warfare and its associated traumas, natural disaster ...

. Haidt discusses how and why some people grow from their suffering, along with ways of improving one's chances of finding post-traumatic growth. Adversity at the right time in life, as

Robert Sternberg Robert J. Sternberg (born December 8, 1949) is an American psychologist and psychometrician. He is a Professor of Human Development at Cornell University. Sternberg has a BA from Yale University and a PhD from Stanford University, under adviso ...

's research on wisdom shows, can make people more compassionate and better able to balance the needs of self and others.

Ch.8: The felicity of virtue

Taking

Benjamin Franklin Benjamin Franklin (April 17, 1790) was an American polymath: a writer, scientist, inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, publisher and Political philosophy, political philosopher.#britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Wood, 2021 Among the m ...

as an example, Haidt looks at how success can follow virtue, in the broad sense of virtue that goes back to the

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

arete () is a concept in ancient Greek thought that refers to "excellence" of any kind—especially a person or thing's "full realization of potential or inherent function." The term may also refer to excellence in "Virtue, moral virtue." The conce ...

'', excellence. The ancients, according to Haidt, had a sophisticated psychological understanding of virtue, using maxims,

fables Fable is a literary genre defined as a succinct fictional story, in prose or verse (poetry), verse, that features animals, legendary creatures, plants, inanimate objects, or forces of nature that are Anthropomorphism, anthropomorphized, and that ...

and role-models to train "the elephant," the automatic responses of the individual. Though the beginnings of Western virtue lie in

Homer Homer (; , ; possibly born ) was an Ancient Greece, Ancient Greek poet who is credited as the author of the ''Iliad'' and the ''Odyssey'', two epic poems that are foundational works of ancient Greek literature. Despite doubts about his autho ...

Aesop Aesop ( ; , ; c. 620–564 BCE; formerly rendered as Æsop) was a Greeks, Greek wikt:fabulist, fabulist and Oral storytelling, storyteller credited with a number of fables now collectively known as ''Aesop's Fables''. Although his existence re ...

and the

Old Testament The Old Testament (OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible, or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew and occasionally Aramaic writings by the Isr ...

, the modern understanding of it has much to do with the arguments of

Kant Immanuel Kant (born Emanuel Kant; 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German philosopher and one of the central Enlightenment thinkers. Born in Königsberg, Kant's comprehensive and systematic works in epistemology, metaphysics, et ...

(the

categorical imperative The categorical imperative () is the central philosophical concept in the deontological Kantian ethics, moral philosophy of Immanuel Kant. Introduced in Kant's 1785 ''Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals'', it is a way of evaluating motivati ...

) and Bentham (

utilitarianism In ethical philosophy, utilitarianism is a family of normative ethical theories that prescribe actions that maximize happiness and well-being for the affected individuals. In other words, utilitarian ideas encourage actions that lead to the ...

). With these came a shift from character ethics to quandary ethics, from moral education to moral reasoning. To address the question of how a common morality can be forged in a diverse society, Haidt turns to

positive psychology Positive psychology is the scientific study of conditions and processes that contribute to positive psychological states (e.g., contentment, joy), well-being, Positive psychology of relationships, positive relationships, and positive institutio ...

, specifically to Seligman and Peterson's work on virtues and strengths.

Ch.9: Divinity with or without God

Using the metaphor of

Flatland ''Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions'' is a satirical novella by the English schoolmaster Edwin Abbott Abbott, first published in 1884 by Seeley & Co. of London. Written pseudonymously by "A Square", the book used the fictional two-dime ...

, Haidt argues that the perception of sacredness and divinity are two basic features of the human mind; the emotions of disgust, moral elevation, and awe tell us about this dimension, but not everybody listens. The " religious right" can only be understood by acknowledging this dimension, which most liberals and secular thinkers ignore or misunderstand. The work of

William James William James (January 11, 1842 – August 26, 1910) was an American philosopher and psychologist. The first educator to offer a psychology course in the United States, he is considered to be one of the leading thinkers of the late 19th c ...

and of

Abraham Maslow Abraham Harold Maslow ( ; April 1, 1908 – June 8, 1970) was an American psychologist who created Maslow's hierarchy of needs, a theory of psychological health predicated on fulfilling innate human needs in priority, culminating in self-actua ...

(on "

peak experience A peak experience is an altered state of consciousness characterized by euphoria, often achieved by self-actualizing individuals. The concept was originally developed by psychologist Abraham Maslow in mid-1940s and term was coined by him in 1956 ...

s") shows ways in which this dimension is also relevant to the non-religious.

Ch.10: Happiness comes from between

Haidt discusses "the meaning of life," making the distinction between a purpose ''for'' life and a purpose ''within'' life. Love and work give a sense of meaning to life. A study by

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi Mihaly Robert Csikszentmihalyi ( , , ; 29 September 1934 – 20 October 2021) was a Hungarian-American psychologist. He recognized and named the psychological concept of " flow", a highly focused mental state conducive to productivity. He w ...

Howard Gardner Howard Earl Gardner (born July 11, 1943) is an American developmental psychologist and the John H. and Elisabeth A. Hobbs Research Professor of Cognition and Education at Harvard University. He was a founding member of Harvard Project Zero in 1967 ...

and

William Damon William Damon (born 1944) is an American psychologist who is a retired professor at Stanford University and a senior fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. He is one of the world's leading scholars of human development. Damon has don ...

established the concept of "vital engagement" which characterises work with the most sense of purpose. "Cross-level coherence" within one's self and life is also vital, coherence between the physical, psychological and sociocultural levels. Haidt argues that religion is an evolved mechanism for creating this coherence.

Ch.11: On balance

Haidt concludes by arguing that the ancient idea of

Yin and Yang Originating in Chinese philosophy, yin and yang (, ), also yinyang or yin-yang, is the concept of opposite cosmic principles or forces that interact, interconnect, and perpetuate each other. Yin and yang can be thought of as complementary an ...

turns out to be the wisest idea of all. We need, he writes, the perspectives of ancient religion and modern science; of east and west; even of liberal and conservative. "Words of wisdom really do flood over us, but only by drawing from many sources can we become wise."

Reception

''The Happiness Hypothesis'' received positive reviews.

Daniel Nettle Daniel Nettle (born 1970) is a British behavioural scientist, biologist and social scientist. He is notable for his research that integrates psychology with evolutionary and comparative biology. After obtaining a BA in Psychology and Philosophy a ...

, reviewing the book in ''

Nature Nature is an inherent character or constitution, particularly of the Ecosphere (planetary), ecosphere or the universe as a whole. In this general sense nature refers to the Scientific law, laws, elements and phenomenon, phenomena of the physic ...

'', accepted its central premise of a "striking similarity between the advice of the ancients on how to live, and the thoughts of modern psychologists on how to have a healthy mind." He was impressed by the breadth of Haidt's grasp of modern behavioural science, and found the book "by some margin the most intellectually substantial book to arise from the 'positive psychology' movement." James Flint concluded his review of the book in ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

'' saying, "I don't think I've ever read a book that laid out the contemporary understanding of the human condition with such simple clarity and sense." Christopher Hart writing in ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...

'' described the book as "humane, witty and comforting...brilliantly synthesising ancient cultural insights with modern psychology."

References

External links

www.happinesshypothesis.com – author's website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Happiness Hypothesis 2006 non-fiction books Happiness Popular psychology books Works by Jonathan Haidt