One of the best phone calls I had in 2012 was with John Havens, who has written about the value of a happiness economy and how big data can make us happier and healthier. It reminded me of the “what if health care…?” conversations I was part of on Twitter this year: dreaming big, wishing out loud, no matter how irrationally optimistic it seemed.
Based on that conversation, I became a founding member of a committee of people working to create a new Indicator/Index for Happiness called The H(app)athon Project. I hope you’ll check out these slides and consider signing up for the newsletter/survey. Stay tuned for details about an event in NYC on March 20, 2013. I can’t wait to see what happens next!
Rats, I’ll be in transit that day, probably flying over NYC!
Fascinated with this whole idea, though.
It really is intriguing — and March 20 is just one day, one event — there will be more!
Reminds me of a more open minded definition of health by Jadad et al: “the ability to adapt and self manage in the face of social, physical, and emotional challenges.” Source: http://www.bmj.com/content/343/bmj.d4817. Rather, I anticipate h(app)iness to be even more open minded and positive than this.
Nice! I started reading and realized I need to bookmark it for, um, not 9:45pm on a Friday night after having a big group of friends over. Happiness is… Health is…
Yes, Roni, I think as we progress in our thinking about “Who gets to define what ‘quality’ is, in healthcare?” we’ll start to see decisions that are based on “So, if we can’t have EVERYthing, what changes will leave us happiest, all things considered?”
What if healthcare were about a happy life, above all?
Then, hacking happiness could add new value to everything we need in healthcare, and relieve the need for everything that doesn’t boost happiness.
Wow! Honored I was one of your best calls in 2012, and I love the other comments on the piece. Thank you! I also can’t wait I see where our Project goes and 3/20 as well. And h(app)y new year to all!
Great to see that you are taking this on. I have spent quite a bit of time over the last few years reading up on this subject and have a few comments.
First, aside from the recent books addressing the topic directly, there are many others that certainly contain insight that contributes to overall picture. A few of the ones that I have found worthwhile include:
– Peak by Chris Conley: http://www.amazon.com/Peak-Great-Companies-Their-Maslow/dp/0787988618
– Drive by Daniel Pink: http://www.amazon.com/Drive-Surprising-Truth-About-Motivates/dp/1594484805
– Connected by Christakis & Fowler: http://www.amazon.com/Connected-Surprising-Networks-Friends-Everything/dp/0316036137
– Talent Code by Daniel Coyle: http://www.amazon.com/Talent-Code-Greatness-Born-Grown/dp/055380684X
I was also somewhat surprised to see the volume of on-going research in the area. I’m assuming you have come across a good deal of this but, if not, the Journal of Happiness Studies (http://www.springer.com/social+sciences/well-being/journal/10902) is one place to keep track of some of the academic work. Also, I did a quick search for related NIH funded project and came up with these: http://1.usa.gov/UAmar4.
No end to good multimedia on this as well:
– Radiolab is always a good source for a unique perspective: http://www.radiolab.org/search/?q=happiness#q=happiness
– TED: What Makes Us Happy? http://www.ted.com/themes/what_makes_us_happy.html
I’ll leave it at this for now but plan to jump in at some point give some of my own thoughts :).
Thanks so much! I hadn’t thought about Connected as a happiness-related book, but of course it is. I’d been focused on the public health implications of their observations about weight loss/gain and smoking cessation. Can’t wait to dig into the other stuff you listed — and please do add your own thoughts later.
What a great initiative! I am in. Maybe we can do a simulcast event in #Cincinnati. Please keep me in the loop on progress. We can bring 5 Universities,several start-ups and several health organizations to the table through our Innov8 for Health initiative.
This is very, very exciting!! I’m so glad to see this type of research being elevated to this degree. For a client of mine, we were just talking about the relation between health and happiness for a variety of reasons that I can’t share here, but I’ve felt strongly for awhile that public health would benefit from looking at GNH. Maybe we can get this into Healthy People 2030. 😉
I have a starred comment thread between you and I that I hope to one day follow-up on regarding the week in my AU curriculum where I focus on the “dark sides of social media”. These dark side themes is partially what drives my interest in digital literacy research and how that intersects with happiness and health. As one example, I have my students draw a line in the classroom that reflects the spectrum of “strongly agree” “agree” “neutral” “disagree” and “strongly disagree”. Then, I give statements and ask them to ponder and stand by the response they align with, statements like:
— “The Internet makes me more creative.”
— “I feel more connected with friends and family when on Facebook.”
— “I can’t live without the Internet.”
It creates a fascinating classroom discussion and elevates an awareness around both the opportunities and potential fallacies of technology and the Internet.
Anywho… that’s a long comment to say “I’m pumped!” to hear about this research and can’t wait to see how it evolves and/or how I can help!
Cheers,
Alex
Kent Bottles is one of my favorite curators, so I hope he won’t mind when I excerpt a chunk of his year-end blog post to share here:
An Information Flaneur’s Best Blog Posts of 2012
[…]
The American preoccupation with Happiness is wrongheaded but extremely important
Even though I have read at last count 19 books on happiness, I am always a little bit skeptical about the whole enterprise. I do find it fascinating that bronze medal winners are happier than silver medal winners and that winning the lottery often results in misery, but there is something wrongheaded about pursuing happiness as a goal. Viewing Stefan Sagmeister’s The Happy Show at an art museum at the University of Pennsylvania inspired me to write a four part blog post on happiness: http://www.thedoctorweighsin.com/musings-on-stefan-sagmeisters-the-happy-show/, http://www.thedoctorweighsin.com/musings-on-stefan-sagmeister-the-happy-show-part-ii/, http://www.thedoctorweighsin.com/musings-on-stefan-sagmeister-the-happy-show-part-iii/, http://kentbottles.blogspot.com/2012/05/musings-on-stefan-sagmeister-happy-show_21.html.
My skepticism about the whole subject made me write The Downsides of Trying Too Hard to Be Happy, which can be found here http://www.thedoctorweighsin.com/the-downsides-of-trying-too-hard-to-be-happy-part-i/ and http://www.thedoctorweighsin.com/the-downsides-of-trying-too-hard-to-be-happy-part-ii/. I just finished reading a new book by Oliver Burkeman titled The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can’t Stand Positive Thinking, which has reinforced and brought focus to my skepticism. I recommend it highly.
[…]
/end of excerpt
There’s a new event on the Happathon horizon: Feb. 20, 2013, in New York City, during Social Media Week:
http://socialmediaweek.org/blog/event/get-happy/
This event is open to the public so please tell anyone you know in the NY area about it — I think it’s a great chance to get involved.