Happiness First, Success Later: The Direction of Causality
Success doesn't just make you happy happiness is actually a primary cause of your income, health, and relationship success.
What This Study Is About
A monumental meta-analysis of 225 papers ($n \approx 275,000$) proving that positive affect is a functional resource that builds success in work, relationships, and health.
💡 Mindeln Tip
Treat your 'Positive Affect' as a business asset, not a luxury. Since happiness causes success, spending 15 minutes a day on activities that boost your mood is not a distraction it's a high-ROI strategic investment in your future leadership capacity. Pro tip: When you're feeling down, take a moment to reflect on your strengths and accomplishments this simple act can trigger a cascade of positive thoughts and behaviors.
Key Insights
Positive Affect (PA) precedes and leads to successful outcomes in marriage, income, and work performance.
Happiness is not merely a correlate of success; it engenders success by encouraging 'approach goals' and resource building.
Happy individuals build more physical, social, and intellectual resources during pleasant moods, known as the 'broaden-and-build' model.
Experimental evidence confirms that induced positive mood directly leads to adaptive behaviors like creativity, sociability, and altruism.
The characteristics of happy people (confidence, optimism, self-efficacy) encourage active involvement with the environment.
Longitudinal studies show that early happiness levels are robust predictors of later career achievement and higher future income.
Positive emotions prepare the organism for future challenges by expanding its repertoire of skills and social ties.
The Full Story
This landmark study by Lyubomirsky, King, and Diener challenges the traditional 'work hard to be happy' paradigm. By synthesizing cross-sectional, longitudinal, and experimental data, the researchers demonstrate that positive affect is a functional asset. When you are in a positive mood, your brain is ideally situated to 'broaden' its thinking and 'build' long-term resources. While most assume money or marriage leads to happiness, this meta-analysis proves the alternative causal pathway: happy people are more likely to acquire favorable life circumstances because their psychological state drives them to seek new goals and build resilient networks.
Original Research Source
View the original research paper to dive deeper into the methodology, data, and findings.
View Original Paper