Sunday 10 April 2005

Pic of the day: Imaginary child from Sims2, doing homework on the lawn.

Self-reporting happiness

One of the latest issues of Psychology Today had various articles about happiness. In one of these, it was claimed that couples did not actually get happier by having a kid, even though they thought they would. Repeated experiments with playing Sims2 seems to verify this. Children are a lot of stress, and although you have new joys you also have new worries. Anyway, the interesting part was something that was not really touched on in the article. As they pointed out, the only way to know about people's happiness is by asking them. And if you ask most couples after they have the children, they will no doubt tell you that yes, they are happier than they were when they were only two. But if you tell them to place their current happiness on a numeric scale, they will place themselves in roughly the same place as before (if you wait long enough for them to forget the details of the previous interview).

What is up with this? I'll tell you. They will place their current happiness at the same level as before, but they will place their previous happiness lower. They will basically tell you that no, they weren't really that happy before. Of course, if you confront them about it, things could get embarassing at the least. But that is the heart of it. They rewrite their past. And this is a normal human behaviour.

Some people which I otherwise hold in high regard, were going to the same Christian meetings as I did. They seemed quite happy about this, and expressed their happiness and gratitude. This went on for quite a while. Then came a collective change of heart, as the church began to start using new techniques and focusing on other values than before. Now some people were just as happy with this, which is OK. But there was also the rare person who would now make disparaging statements about their former state of mind. This really upset me. If you're telling me that you have been lying before me and your friends and family and in the face of God almighty himself for years, why would I suddenly start believing you now?

And yet I would not be surprised if they were honest in both cases. They now simply remember a past which did not actually exist when they lived through it. False memories exist and are a scary thing. Several studies have shown that if people you normally trust feed you false memories, you will more likely than not adopt them. And then you will integrate them with your normal memories, and start adding details of your own that are typical of yourself. This makes me now suspect that the reason why I seem somewhat more resistant than others to this, is that I don't trust anyone else.

Even so, I am not immune. I may not fabricate events out of thin air, but I forget memorable events, and I forget details and embellish other details. For instance, early this month most of us Norwegian got our tax declarations (the papers we have to fill in for our tax return). New this year is that ALL tax declarations can be made over the Internet, no matter whether you're a businessman, a worker or a pensioner. This is cool and gives my native Norway a boost in the "e-government" ratings that nations compete about these days. However, I remember clearly that there was some kind of lottery you would automatically enter into if you posted your tax declaration electronically before a certain date (a week or so prior to the final day, which is when most Norwegians grudgingly hands it in). Today I spent an hour or more looking for this detail, which I remember as being quite clearly pointed out. I cannot find a trace of it. I still think I actually read it. But did I? I wouldn't swear or even bet on it anymore.

The ironic thing is that the Norwegian name for the tax declaration literally translates as "self-report" (or in book language, "self- betrayal", which may account for its unpopularity...)

With brains like these, I think everyone ought to have their own daily journal! Just so you can know who you really were, not just who you are.