Take Control of Your Happiness
by Linda J. Brown
Posted 2/17/07
Is acting socially extroverted the key to being happy? It’s certainly not that simple, but recent research has found that becoming more active and expressive does make people happier.
In a trio of studies of 150 college students, researchers asked students to keep diaries of their feelings for two weeks. They then rated their level of extroverted behavior and their moods each week for 10 weeks. Finally, participants were told to act passive and shy or assertive and energetic in a group discussion. “Every single participant was happier when he or she acted extroverted than when he or she acted introverted,” says study founder William Fleeson, PhD, Ollen R. Nalley associate professor of psychology at Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, N.C.
Fleeson interprets his work to suggest that personality is a factor in happiness and to a certain degree we have control over our personalities. Even those students who were considered introverted personalities were happier when they forced themselves to be more assertive and energetic, indicating that we can choose to be happy.
So if you’re feeling down, why not put this study to the test? Start a conversation with someone new, voice an opinion, make eye contact and smile more often, offer a helping hand to someone or jump into a discussion instead of hanging back and seeing what happens. The results just might make you grin.
(ATMJ05)
