Happiness and Wellbeing:
Emerging Lessons from Social Science.
Jerome Carson and Sandie McHugh.
.
Structure
of presentation:
Your own happiness? Questionnaire.
Happiness in Worktown
Happiness today
Prize draw
.
“Happiness is the meaning and purpose of life,
the whole aim and end of human existence.”
Aristotle
.
“Happiness is when what you think, what you
say and what you do, are in harmony.”
.
What
is happiness?
Advertisers have been trying to tell us this for
years. Here are a couple of ads that more mature
participants may recall.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NIckHmwZAeI
.
Bolton
in the 1930’s
1931 census 14,555 Boltonians out of work.
Population then 177,000. Unemployed formed 17% of occupied male
population and 12% of female population.
The town had 300 pubs, six dance-halls and 47 cinemas within 5 miles of town
hall. 200 churches and chapels.
What was happening in 1938?
.
Hitler drives into
Vienna
Franco wins
Crucial
Battle in Spain
Preston
North End
beat
Huddersfield
in Cup Final
at Wembley
.
Worktown
Competitions.
“Competitions provide a way of going beyond the reports of Boltonians written
by Mass Observers to access the self-authored perspectives of Bolton people
themselves,” (Gazely and Langhamer, 2013)
Prize of £5 offered for the best account of, “How I spent one day of my
September holidays?” Generated 564 responses.
Another asked, “What do you like about all-in Wrestling?”
Worktown Happiness Survey
.
th
28
. . April 1938 advert in Bolton Evening News
“What is Happiness?”
Judge Professor John Hilton
Competition one of many to research everyday life in Bolton 1937-1940
Letters from 226 individuals
Follow-up questionnaire
Harrisson chose Bolton, renamed “Worktown,” “an emblematic location
from which to observe a working class regarded by those outside of it
as almost a race apart.”
.
Analysis
of Worktown Happiness Survey:
7 categories based on work of social psychologist Hadley Cantril (1934)
SELF (personal values, development, character)
MATERIAL (personal economic situation, job/work)
HEALTH
RELATIONAL (family and friends)
VALUES (moral, social, political)
WORLD EVENTS (international situation)
NATURAL WORLD
¾ of respondents mentioned aspects of SELF in their letters
.
Worktown
Happiness Survey.
“Mental harmony, a peaceful and contented mind and a clear conscience,
often underpinned by religious faith or other moral frameworks.”
Gazely and Langhamer (2013)
“True and lasting happiness is a mental and spiritual state found only
from within ourselves. When we are right in the sight of God. There can
be no happiness without service.”
“Happiness is the greatest thing in life that money can’t buy.”
“To know joy you must have sorrow.”
1938– 10 aspects of happiness
Please number in order of importance, 1 to 10, which of the following you think more
important to true happiness, with 1 as the most important and 10 as least.
Equality
Beauty
Pleasure
Security
Politics
Religion
Humour
Knowledge
Action
Leadership & Authority
.
Worktown
Happiness Survey.
Top 3
Security
Knowledge
Religion
Bottom 3 Pleasure
Leadership
Politics
.
Leo Bormans
Contemporary Views of Happiness.
.
Professor Martin Seligman
The pleasant life
The engaged life
The meaningful life
.
Bury
College Students.
(2013, n = 338) Ian Platt, Steven Barnes, Ruqiah Fatima, Lynda Thorpe and
Jerome Carson.
Top 3
Security
Humour
Equality
Bottom 3 Authority
Religion
Politics
.
Happiness
across the years
Worktown (1938)
Bury (2013)
Bolton (2014)
Top 3
Security
Knowledge
Religion
Security
Humour
Equality
Security
Humour
Equality
Bottom 3
Pleasure
Leadership
Politics
Authority
Religion
Politics
Leadership
Politics
Religion
1938 – 10 aspects of happiness
discourse /explanation for 2014
More equality
More politics
More equality in wealth
More say in political decisions
More beauty
More religion
More attractive living & working
environment
More religious influence in society
More leadership
More good humour
More direction from local & national
decision makers
More smiling and laughter for myself
& those around me
More leisure
More knowledge
More time to do the things I enjoy
More access and opportunities to
learn new things
More economic security
More action
More certainty for maintaining &
maybe improving my living standards
More action to solve not shelve my
problems
.
.
The
prize draw
Contact Details
oesso
Professor Jerome
Carson,
J.Carson@bolton.ac.uk
SS
S
Sandie McHugh,
Sandie McHugh
S.McHugh@bolton.ac.uk
s.mchugh@bolton.ac.uk