Comments on: Happiness and Personality: Indviduality Matters

By: Devin Shirley

Devin Shirley — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 18:32:59 +0000

your blog is great 617 gratz!

By: Payout Percentages

Payout Percentages — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 12:38:25 +0000

It would really help the ones who just want to take their communication toe the higher level as it is become very important to have such interpersonal and communication skills which easily attract the other person.
thanks for this post having such wonderful and useful information about personality development.

By: James

James — Sat, 15 Mar 2008 05:30:45 +0000

All these twins lived in the same or similar countries presumably. I could see where the mix of personalities around a person might have a large effect on which personality "build" is best for happiness. An introvert in a nation of extroverts probably won't do as well as if he were surrounded by fellow introverts. Does this study get into that? Would Kevin still slap his forehead if it did?

By: Club Troppo » Missing Link Daily

Club Troppo » Missing Link Daily — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 23:23:20 +0000

[...] Wilkinson continues his focus on happiness research, which should make Andrew Norton, James Farrell and other happiness [...]

By: Michele Connolly

Michele Connolly — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 21:12:20 +0000

The happiness-personality link is a hot issue for me, not least because I score high on both introversion and neuroticism but have LEARNED how to be happy – very happy, in fact.

But for me, the big lesson of the personality-happiness research is that about half of happiness variance is not accounted for by either genes/personality or demographics/circumstances. That leave a lot of potential for raising our own happiness via ‘intentional’ factors. Great news for Neurotic introverts like moi.

[I have several posts on the topic at http://www.happinessstrategies.com/blog/category/personality/

By: bjk

bjk — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 18:13:39 +0000

Extraverts are notorious liars.

By: Will Wilkinson

Will Wilkinson — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 13:00:36 +0000

April, Great points. In fact, I’m really attracted to meditation because it’s the only thing that really seems to make a deep difference. Better than Ritalin, anyway.

Winston, Yeah, I should have mentioned that.

By: Winton Bates

Winton Bates — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 06:05:32 +0000

A point that might be worth adding is that heritable differences in self-reported happiness only account for (from memory) about half of the total variation in self-reported happiness. So it is possible to acknowledge the importance of personality without suggesting that other factors, such as income, are not important.

By: April

April — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 04:48:58 +0000

Great post Will.
I’m too cheap to pay the $29 for the article – but I’d find it more interesting if they break down the category of introversion-extraversion into its three consitituent parts: ease of interpersonal communication/social interaction; whether the person recharges by being alone vs with others; and, degree of comfort with self-revelation. One could easily imagine that these characteristics might be differentially related to happiness.

Another interesting thing to contemplate is whether certain personality characteristics might or might not predispose people to take up habits (e.g. meditation) which have proven effective in increasing individual happiness. It’s possible meditation may even work through shifting a personality characteristic. I think it has made me more conscientious, for example.

By: Will Wilkinson

Will Wilkinson — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 02:41:14 +0000

Kevin, That’s what the test says! I was raised in a hyper-conscientious culture, and I am unusual in a number of useful ways, which helps a lot. Otherwise, I might be screwed. A high school girlfriend once told me I’d end up the smartest guy working the Quik-Trip. This has always haunted me, because it’s never been hard for me to imagine how that could happen. But yes, I am extremely conscientious for a person so low on native conscientiousness. Current and future employers please take note.

By: Kevin B. O'Reilly

Kevin B. O'Reilly — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 02:23:25 +0000

This is one of those forehead-slapping research results. Individual personality matters in individual happiness? No, duh!

I appreciate the population-wide average impact of social systems on individual happiness, but there’s obvious variety within populations, even families, that is accounted for by personality.

On another note, I find it hard to believe, Will, that you are low in conscientiousness especially in relative terms. Perhaps the fact that you regard yourself as *unsconscientious* shows how conscientious you really are!