Subjective Well-Being Is Desirable, but Not the Summum Bonum

Subjective well-being is a broad term that encompasses the various ways people evaluate their lives, including concepts such as life satisfaction, pleasant emotions, satisfaction with domains such as work and health, feelings of fulfillment and meaning, and low levels of unpleasant emotions. Subject...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: DIENER, Ed, SCOLLON, Christie N.
Format: text
Language:English
Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2003
Subjects:
Online Access:https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/soss_research/912
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Institution: Singapore Management University
Language: English
id sg-smu-ink.soss_research-1911
record_format dspace
spelling sg-smu-ink.soss_research-19112010-08-31T09:30:04Z Subjective Well-Being Is Desirable, but Not the Summum Bonum DIENER, Ed SCOLLON, Christie N. Subjective well-being is a broad term that encompasses the various ways people evaluate their lives, including concepts such as life satisfaction, pleasant emotions, satisfaction with domains such as work and health, feelings of fulfillment and meaning, and low levels of unpleasant emotions. Subjective well-being (SWB) is one component of the good life because lives that are bereft of joy, affection, feelings of fulfillment and meaning, and laden with dissatisfaction, anger, and depression cannot be thought of as ideal, no matter how many other good qualities might be present. On the other hand, we argue that subjective well-being is not the sufficient and final good for which people strive, and to which all other desirable objects are merely a means. People want to be happy, but for the right reasons, and they want certain valued things even in the absence of feelings of happiness. Thus, we argue that subjective well-being is only one of several valued ends that comprise the good life. Social scientists have developed some understanding based on empirical studies of what leads people to evaluate their lives in positive terms. In very recent years, there has also been an analysis of the outcomes of subjective well-being, with the tentative finding that happiness helps people to be successful in some life tasks such as social relationships and earning money. However, there might be optimal levels of certain forms of SWB, such as pleasant emotions, that are only functional when in the long-term they are at submaximal levels – that is, SWB is likely to be dysfunctional if a person is locked into a state of intense positive emotions, and is not able to react to good and bad events. A challenge for future research is to determine whether it is possible to produce interventions to heighten happiness, which at the same time allow people to function effectively in the pursuit of valued social goals. 2003-01-01T08:00:00Z text https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/soss_research/912 Research Collection School of Social Sciences eng Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University Social Psychology
institution Singapore Management University
building SMU Libraries
continent Asia
country Singapore
Singapore
content_provider SMU Libraries
collection InK@SMU
language English
topic Social Psychology
spellingShingle Social Psychology
DIENER, Ed
SCOLLON, Christie N.
Subjective Well-Being Is Desirable, but Not the Summum Bonum
description Subjective well-being is a broad term that encompasses the various ways people evaluate their lives, including concepts such as life satisfaction, pleasant emotions, satisfaction with domains such as work and health, feelings of fulfillment and meaning, and low levels of unpleasant emotions. Subjective well-being (SWB) is one component of the good life because lives that are bereft of joy, affection, feelings of fulfillment and meaning, and laden with dissatisfaction, anger, and depression cannot be thought of as ideal, no matter how many other good qualities might be present. On the other hand, we argue that subjective well-being is not the sufficient and final good for which people strive, and to which all other desirable objects are merely a means. People want to be happy, but for the right reasons, and they want certain valued things even in the absence of feelings of happiness. Thus, we argue that subjective well-being is only one of several valued ends that comprise the good life. Social scientists have developed some understanding based on empirical studies of what leads people to evaluate their lives in positive terms. In very recent years, there has also been an analysis of the outcomes of subjective well-being, with the tentative finding that happiness helps people to be successful in some life tasks such as social relationships and earning money. However, there might be optimal levels of certain forms of SWB, such as pleasant emotions, that are only functional when in the long-term they are at submaximal levels – that is, SWB is likely to be dysfunctional if a person is locked into a state of intense positive emotions, and is not able to react to good and bad events. A challenge for future research is to determine whether it is possible to produce interventions to heighten happiness, which at the same time allow people to function effectively in the pursuit of valued social goals.
format text
author DIENER, Ed
SCOLLON, Christie N.
author_facet DIENER, Ed
SCOLLON, Christie N.
author_sort DIENER, Ed
title Subjective Well-Being Is Desirable, but Not the Summum Bonum
title_short Subjective Well-Being Is Desirable, but Not the Summum Bonum
title_full Subjective Well-Being Is Desirable, but Not the Summum Bonum
title_fullStr Subjective Well-Being Is Desirable, but Not the Summum Bonum
title_full_unstemmed Subjective Well-Being Is Desirable, but Not the Summum Bonum
title_sort subjective well-being is desirable, but not the summum bonum
publisher Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University
publishDate 2003
url https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/soss_research/912
_version_ 1770568291350216704