Top

Journal of Happiness Studies

Published in:

01-03-2011 | Research paper

Momentary Happiness: The Role of Psychological Need Satisfaction

Authors: Ryan T. Howell, David Chenot, Graham Hill, Colleen J. Howell

Published in: Journal of Happiness Studies | Issue 1/2011

Activate our intelligent search to find suitable subject content or patents.

search-config

AI-assisted search

Off

Abstract

Psychological well-being correlates positively with psychological need satisfaction—primarily the needs of autonomy, competence, and relatedness. The current study explores momentary happiness (defined as experienced enjoyment minus experienced stress over the course of an hour) as a function of momentary psychological need satisfaction. Results demonstrate that hour-by-hour ratings of psychological need satisfaction were correlated with momentary happiness, with individual differences in life satisfaction moderating this relationship. Ratings of autonomy and relatedness correlated positively with momentary happiness, while competence was negatively correlated with momentary happiness. Thus, engagement in competence-promoting behaviors may come at an affective cost, at least in the moment. When autonomy and relatedness needs were met, individuals with high levels of life satisfaction experienced greater increases in happiness than individuals with low levels of life satisfaction. This finding supports a sensitization model of well-being. Results are discussed with respect to their implications for self-determination theory (SDT).

next article Affective Well-Being in Retirement: The Influence of Values, Money, and Health Across Three Years

Dont have a licence yet? Then find out more about our products and how to get one now:

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

über 102.000 Bücher
über 537 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

Automobil + Motoren
Bauwesen + Immobilien
Business IT + Informatik
Elektrotechnik + Elektronik
Energie + Nachhaltigkeit
Finance + Banking
Management + Führung
Marketing + Vertrieb
Maschinenbau + Werkstoffe
Versicherung + Risiko

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

inform now

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

über 67.000 Bücher
über 340 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

Bauwesen + Immobilien
Business IT + Informatik
Finance + Banking
Management + Führung
Marketing + Vertrieb
Versicherung + Risiko

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

inform now

This methodology is similar to the Day Reconstruction Method used by Kahneman et al. (2004). While both retrospective/reconstruction diary methods and experience sampling methods have advantages and disadvantages, Kahanmen et al. demonstrated that patterns of affect for experience sampling and retrospective/reconstruction diary methods are comparable.

The definition of momentary happiness used with Sample 2 is consistent with past research describing happiness as affect balance (e.g., positive affect minus negative affect), as this emotional construct is marked by the experience of more positive affect and less negative affect (see Bradburn 1969; Diener et al. 1985; Diener et al. 1999; Lyubomirsky and Lepper 1999).

Diener et al. (1985) found that timeframe greatly impacts the relation between PA and NA, with the strongest negative correlation occurring when the variables were measured as momentary affect. They found that PA and NA became less associated as timeframe increased.

This weak inverse relation with negative affect is consistent with Reis et al. (2000), who found that relatedness was not an important predictor of decreased negative outcomes. Reis et al. suggest that relatedness-promoting behaviors are predictive of positive social activities as well as of increased arguments and conflicts. Thus, it appears that engaging in relatedness-producing (typically social) behaviors increases well-being through positive social interactions, but does not substantially decrease the number of negative emotions associated with negative social interactions.

Argyle, M. (1999). Causes and correlates of happiness. In D. Kahneman, E. Diener, & N. Schwarz (Eds.), Well-being: The foundations of hedonic psychology (pp. 353–373). New York: Russell Sage Foundation.

Arthaud-Day, M. L., & Near, J. P. (2005). The wealth of nations and the happiness of nations: Why “accounting” matters. Social Indicators Research, 74, 511–548.CrossRef

Bandura, A. (1977). Social learning theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Baumeister, R., & Leary, M. R. (1995). The need to belong: Desire for interpersonal attachments as a fundamental human motivation. Psychology Bulletin, 117, 497–529.CrossRef

Bem, D. J., & Funder, D. C. (1978). Predicting more of the people more of the time: Assessing the personality of situation. Psychological Review, 85, 485–501.CrossRef

Berscheid, E., & Reis, H. T. (1998). Interpersonal attraction and close relationships. Handbook of social psychology (4th ed.). New York: Random House.

Bradburn, N. M. (1969). The structure of psychological well-being. Chicago: Alpine.

Carver, C., & Scheier, M. (1990). Origins and function of positive and negative affect: A control-process view. Psychological Review, 97, 19–35.CrossRef

Deci, E., & Ryan, R. (1985). Intrinsic motivation and self-determination in human behavior. New York: Plenum.

Deci, E. L., & Ryan, R. M. (1991). A motivational approach to self: Integration in personality. In R. Dienstbier (Ed.), Nebraska symposium on motivation 1990: Perspectives on motivation (pp. 237–288). Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.

Deci, E. L., Koestner, R., & Ryan, R. M. (1999). A meta-analytic review of experiments examining the effects of extrinsic rewards on intrinsic motivation. Psychological Bulletin, 125, 627–668.CrossRef

Diener, E. (2000). Subjective well-being: The science of happiness and a proposal for a national index. American Psychologist, 55, 34–43.CrossRef

Diener, E., Emmons, R. A., Larsen, R. J., & Griffin, S. (1985). The satisfaction with life scale. Journal of Personality Assessment, 49, 71–75.CrossRef

Diener, E., Suh, E. M., Lucas, R. E., & Smith, H. L. (1999). Subjective well-being: Three decades of progress. Psychological Bulletin, 125, 276–302.CrossRef

Hahn, J., & Oishi, S. (2006). Psychological needs and emotional well-being in older and younger Koreans and Americans. Personality and Individual Differences, 40(4), 689–698.CrossRef

Hershey, J. W. (1999). Personality traits and personal goals in everyday behavior. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of California, Riverside.

Howell, R. T., & Rodzon, K. S. (2009). An exploration of personality-affect relations in daily life: Determining the support for the affect-level and affect-reactivity models. Unpublished manuscript, San Francisco State University, USA.

Kahneman, D., Krueger, A. B., Schkade, D. A., Schwarz, N., & Stone, A. A. (2004). A survey method for characterizing daily life experience: The day reconstruction method (DRM). Science, 1776–1780, 306.

Kashdan, T. B., Julian, T., Merritt, K., & Uswatte, G. (2006). Social anxiety and posttraumatic stress in combat veterens: Relations to well-being and character strengths. Behavior Research and Therapy, 44, 561–583.CrossRef

Kasser, T., & Ryan, R. M. (1996). Further examining the American dream: Differential correlates of intrinsic and extrinsic goals. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 22, 280–287.CrossRef

Kasser, V. M., & Ryan, R. M. (1999). The relation of psychological needs for autonomy and relatedness to health, vitality, well-being and mortality in a nursing home. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 29, 935–954.CrossRef

Lyubomirsky, S., & Lepper, H. (1999). A measure of subjective happiness: Preliminary reliability and construct validation. Social Indicators Research, 46, 137–155.CrossRef

Maslow, A. (1954). Motivation and personality. New York: Harper.

Nezlek, J. B. (2001). Multilevel random coefficient analyses of event and interval contingent data in social and personality psychology research. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 27, 771–785.CrossRef

Raudenbush, S. W., & Bryk, A. S. (2002). Hierarchical linear models: Applications and data analysis methods (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Raudenbush, S. W., Bryk, A. S., & Congdon, R. (2005). HLM6: Hierarchical linear and nonlinear modeling (Version 6) [Computer software]. Lincolnwood, IL: Scientific Software International, Inc.

Reis, H. T., & Gable, S. L. (2000). Event-sampling and other methods for studying everyday experience. In H. T. Reis & C. M. Judd (Eds.), Handbook of research methods in social and personality psychology (pp. 190–222). New York: Cambridge Univ. Press.

Reis, H. T., Sheldon, K. M., Gable, S. L., Roscoe, J., & Ryan, R. M. (2000). Daily well-being: The role of autonomy, competence, and relatedness. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 26, 419–435.CrossRef

Rosenthal, R. (1984). Meta-analytic procedures for social research. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.

Ryan, R. (1995). Psychological needs and the facilitation of integrative processes. Journal of Personality, 63, 397–427.CrossRef

Ryan, R., & Deci, E. L. (2000). Self-determination theory and the facilitaion of intrinsic motivation, social development, and well-being. American Psychologist, 55, 68–78.CrossRef

Ryan, R., & Deci, E. L. (2001). On happiness and human potentials: A review of research on hedonic and eudaimonic well-being. Annual Review of Psychology, 52, 141–166.CrossRef

Schimmack, U., Radhakrishnan, P., Oishi, S., Dzokoto, V., & Ahadi, S. (2002). Culture, personality, and subjective well-being: Integrating process models of life satisfaction. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 82, 582–593.CrossRef

Sheldon, K., & Kasser, T. (1998). Pursuing personal goals: Skills enable progress, but not all progress is beneficial. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 24, 1319–1331.CrossRef

Sheldon, K. M., & Niemiec, C. P. (2006). It’s not just the amount: Balanced need satisfaction also affects well-being. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 91, 331–341.CrossRef

Sheldon, K. M., Ryan, R. M., & Reis, H. T. (1996). What makes for a good day? Competence and autonomy in the day and in the person. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 22, 1270–1279.CrossRef

Stone, A. A., Shiffman, S. S., & DeVries, M. W. (1999). Ecological momentary assessment. In D. Kahneman & E. Diener (Eds.), Well-being: The foundations of hedonic psychology (pp. 26–39). New York: Russell Sage Foundation.

Vansteenkiste, M., Lens, W., Soenens, B., & Luyckx, K. (2006). Autonomy and relatedness among Chinese sojourners and applicants: Conflictual or independent predictors of well-being and adjustment? Motivation and Emotion, 30(4), 273–282.CrossRef

Vittersǿ, J., & Nilsen, F. (2002). The conceptual and relational structure of subjective well-being, neuroticism, and extraversion: Once again, neuroticism is the important predictor of happiness. Social Indicators Research, 57, 89–118.CrossRef

Watson, D., & Clark, L. A. (1994). The PANAS-X: Manual for the positive and negative affect schedule-expanded form. Unpublished manuscript [updated 8/99], University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA.

Title: Momentary Happiness: The Role of Psychological Need Satisfaction
Authors: Ryan T. Howell
David Chenot
Graham Hill
Colleen J. Howell
Publication date: 01-03-2011
Publisher: Springer Netherlands
Published in: Journal of Happiness Studies / Issue 1/2011
Print ISSN: 1389-4978
Electronic ISSN: 1573-7780
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-009-9166-1

Springer Professional

Abstract

Please log in to get access to your license.

Dont have a licence yet? Then find out more about our products and how to get one now:

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik"

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

Other articles of this Issue 1/2011

“Building Hope for the Future”: A Program to Foster Strengths in Middle-School Students

Big Five Personality Traits and Self-Esteem as Predictors of Life Satisfaction in Iranian Muslim University Students

Mispredicting Happiness Across the Adult Lifespan: Implications for the Risky Health Behaviour of Young People

Affective Well-Being in Retirement: The Influence of Values, Money, and Health Across Three Years

Strengths Use as a Predictor of Well-Being and Health-Related Quality of Life

The Demand for Pornography