Аspirations and achievements as factors of happiness / satisfaction: mechanisms of formation

Abstract

The article is devoted to testing hypotheses related to the mechanism of causing the level of happiness / satisfaction. Happiness is usually measured by looking at the whole process from the other side — that is, the factors of happiness / satisfaction that shape the respondent's well-being at a given point in time are measured. Only achievements are measured, but a person's claims to their achievements are not measured. The mechanism considered in the article can be conditionally represented as a fraction, in the numerator of which — the level of security in the broadest sense or the level of achievement (material security, creative work, loved one, etc.), and in the denominator — the level of claims (for example, the level of material security that a person considers sufficient). At the same time, the level of claims is formed depending on the level of achievements of the reference group of the respondent. Since reference groups generally influence a person's self-identification and worldview, they also form a comparison point for the respondent on how happy and successful his or her life is. The author has developed a method for measuring the level of claims and tested a few hypotheses that follow from these ideas about the mechanism of causing happiness / satisfaction. The following hypotheses are made: 1) the higher the level of claims, the lower the level of happiness 2) the ratio of achievement to the level of claims has a significant positive relationship with the level of happiness, 3) the higher the level of financial security of the immediate social environment, the higher the level of claims. Confirmation of the third hypothesis and partial confirmation of the first are received and directions of further research are outlined.