Abstract
ABSTRACT In this paper, we introduce the concept of ‘societal emotional environment’: the emotional climate of a society (operationalized as the degree to which positive and negative emotions are expressed in a society). Using data collected from 12,888 participants across 49 countries, we show how societal emotional environments vary across countries and cultural clusters, and we consider the potential importance of these differences for well-being. Multilevel analyses supported a ‘double-edged sword’ model of negative emotion expression, where expression of negative emotions predicted higher life satisfaction for the expresser but lower life satisfaction for society. In contrast, partial support was found for higher societal life satisfaction in positive societal emotional environments. Our study highlights the potential utility and importance of distinguishing between positive and negative emotion expression, and adopting both individual and societal perspectives in well-being research. Individual pathways to happiness may not necessarily promote the happiness of others.
Highlights
In this paper, we introduce the concept of ‘societal emotional environment’: the emotional climate of a society
We propose that in order to better comprehend societal and individual well-being, positive psychologists may need to study the societal emotional environment’ (SEE): the emotional climate in a given society that is constituted by the frequency of expressed positive emotions and the frequency of expressed negative emotions
Positive societal emotional environment (PSEE) and Negative societal emotional environment (NSEE) scores were calculated by taking the average self-reported frequency of positive emotion expression and the average self-reported frequency of negative emotion expression, respectively, for each country
Summary
We introduce the concept of ‘societal emotional environment’: the emotional climate of a society (operationalized as the degree to which positive and negative emotions are expressed in a society). Latin Americans, in contrast, tend to prefer high arousal positive emotions (e.g., excitement, elatedness; Ruby et al, 2012), and free, frequent, and intensive emotional expression is considered a constitutive feature of Latin American cultures (Garza, 1978; Triandis et al, 1984). These three components are recognised as distinct, but mutually reinforcing factors (Busseri, 2018) Following this at the cultural level of analysis, we propose that SEE and societal life satisfaction (understood as the average sense of life satisfaction in a given society) constitute non-orthogonal but distinct constructs.. One’s sense of life satisfaction is not as perceptible and may have a more limited impact on the a ect of people around (and on a ect expression in particular)
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