For 72 years, researchers at Harvard have been following 268 men who started college in the late 1930s through war, marriage, fatherhood, their careers, divorces, sickness, health, and old age. Joshua Wolf Shenk has examined the records and archives of this study, one of the most comprehensive longitudinal studies in history. It offers insight into the human condition—and into the mind of its longtime director, George Vaillant. The article "What Makes Us Happy," appears in the June issue of the Atlantic magazine.
Guests:
Joshua Wolf Shenk
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Comments [8]
Leonard, what a teaser. You kept promising us the results of the study. Instead your guest Joshua was long winded and awash in psycho babble. Perhaps you could have done a better job of keeping him on topic.
I just turned on the mp3 to get Judy Garland singing "Get Happy" - how great, and I guess, how ironic. Thank you, Lopate show.
#4, I'd suggest that there are underlyiing issues of depression/"unhappiness" in any compulsive behavior such as alcoholism, but agree with you that morality is the lesser issue. There is a component of morality, but...
Leonard,
Can you ask your guest what he thinks a study like this would show in other parts of the world?
Perhaps in a Scandanavian country, or countries with less social disparity than we may have here in the US.
Thanks.
How did the study take into account the effect of a prestigious group tracking the lives of the participants as important. Who wouldn't like (at some level) the idea that a whole group of people is organizaed around asking them how they're doing? Does the study itself contribute to their happiness?
Also, is happiness defined only as the participants self identification?
i find it disconcerting that in the year 2009, very learned people describe the disease of alcoholism in terms of a moral failing, or even a result of unhappiness.
The advantage of gender? Males may have the societal advantage, but females have the advantage when it comes to health, & esp. longevity. I know the study focuses on happiness, but it seems to me there's been an emphasis on health in the conversation so far. (Hmm, considering who's in the study, isn't that the wrong picture to illustrate it on today's main page?)
Is this not the equivalent of nutritionism? Reductionism be damned (and read Aristotle!)
The link to the article doesn't work. :(
From the Leonard Lopate Show Staff: This has been fixed.
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