The Secret to Happiness-Counseling Psychology

nones and Happiness The Problems of Understanding its Dynamic Relationship The want of m one(a)y is the first of all told evil. Samuel furtherler- Our society holds a taboo when it comes to explicitly speaking of the entrust for gold. However, at the same time our behaviors implicitly show us the extent of this desire. Many people spend much time analyzing the stock food market for their next bid, millions of people buy lottery tickets sounding for their big break, and umteen people fight with their siblings all over their dead parents fortune.And the reason we so urgently pursue the accumulation of wealth is because we guess in its commanding influence. We believe it will change our lives into a bankrupt one. We think it will sterilize us happier. (Campbell, 1981) However, this is an issue still in question and an important one especially for counseling psychology. In this field, the relationship between cash and emotional call down contentment is essential due to its relevance to course counseling. Considering that a jobs pecuniary reward and thusly its socioeconomic status is influential in career orientation for some people, the clarification of such relationship becomes crucial.And in tally to the importance of this issue, there has been abundant seek relating to it. However, the results face to be combine and confusing. The purpose of this paper is to point out the shortcomings of previous works on this issue and additionally, to provide a new scope into which will be a guide for further research on this issue. Problems in auditions and variables preceding studies score attempted to see if money increases happiness by looking into the lives of those who bewilder a lot of money.But some of these studies seem to have missed out on a vital factor, sample size. In a study of some of the wealthiest people in the United States, Diener et al. (1985) ready the happiness levels of these people to be only slightly supra bonny than t hat of people with regular incomes. However, the sample size for this study was only 49. Also, Brickman et al. (1978) lay down that lottery winners were not happier than controls even after their sudden fortune. But his research contained only 22 lottery winners as bankrupticipants.In both cases the sample size was much too small to throw away a full general rule out of their research. There could have been plenty of other happier flush(p) people who are on the Forbes 500 list or won the lottery but did not participate in the study. So it seems overt that in future studies, the sample size should be enlarged as much as possible. This would be easier nowadays due to the increased come of millionaires and billionaires in general and quicker access to them through with(predicate) e-mail. Sometimes researchers seem to have failed to fully analyze the variables they used in their research.In a more recent study, researchers found that income increase over the course of 10 years h ad only a small positive impact on happiness (North et al. , 2008). This time the size of the sample was relatively large by 274, but certain variables within this sample diminished the implication of this study. isolated from the sample beingness from a concentrated area (San Francisco Bay area) and being mostly consisted of Caucasians (89%), the researchers have not fully analyzed the spending patterns of the samples income. They but tried to correlate the total income with other variables such as happiness.But considering the possible fluctuations of expenditure during the course of 10 years, for example, due to emergencies or childrens college tuitions, the net outlay of the increased income could have been no different during those 10 years. According to other research, having a strong sense of control over ones financial state brush aside be linked to greater overall satisfaction and that strong sense of control is possible if there is capable net worth of income (Cummi ns, 2000). So without knowing whether the participants had sufficient net worth it would be somewhat misleading say that more income does not hand to more happiness.Mixed Results The researches shown above are only a fewer of many that touch upon this issue of money and happiness. And due to many variables that down the relationship of the two, there have been plenty of mixed results. It has been shown that happiness is potently correlated with increasing income at poverty levels (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002) whereas once income exceeds that level and sanctioned needs are met, money matters only a little (Myers, 2000). On the other hand, there has been research that money generates opportunities for individuals to make better decisions that forgo them to improve their well-being (Schwartz, 2004).But then again, more money seems to generate possibilities for negative events in career such as divorce (Clydesdale, 1997). What all these decisions and many others lead us to conc lude is the old adage gold isnt everything. Considering Other Variables But knowing just that would not be fruitful. So in response to this unsurprising insight there have been many attempts to clear up the variables in which allow the correlation between money and well-being to be more clear.In one study, Johnson and Krueger (2006) collected a nationwide sample of 719 twin pairs in the United States. The researchers have demonstrated, through methods of self-report surveys, that an individuals actual available money explained only about 10% of peoples perceptions of financial well-being, proving the old adage. Along with this conclusion they showed that perceived financial situation and perceived control over diverse life domains mediate the relationship between wealth and life satisfaction.In other words, those who believed that they have more control over their financial state and/or those who perceived their financial state in a positive light were happier with regard to h ow much money they had. This research is meaningful in that it tried to connect relative psychological factors that take crucial part in this issue of money and happiness. However this research is qualified in terms of understanding the question Will earning more money make us happy? The main defect it has is that, because their study was not establish on longitudinal data it does not show whether more money now than before makes happiness. It focused more on the effect of money on peoples well-being at a fixed time. Research Questions Considering that psychological factors can have a fundamental contribution to life satisfaction concerning money, an attractive research question would be whether increased income and the ability to perceive change, or retrospect, ones socioeconomic status have an impact on life satisfaction.One can assume that if an individual can clearly perceive how much better oneself is doing than before then that person might feel happier than someone who does not see that upward change. But one major factor these studies mentioned above miss out on is personal desire and set. So it would be also interesting to find out if people with different values or desires have different affects by increasing incomes. More specifically, finding out whether people who peg certain emotional rewards to the cquisition of material goods, and hence are extrinsically motivated, are more likely to become happier as their income increases would be a relevant research question. It would be recommendable for both research questions to be done by longitudinal studies. Conclusion This paper has looked into researches concerning money and happiness. This estimation was found to be important not only because it concerns our modern life perception about happiness but also because this perception is a crucial element in making career plans for ones life.Current research has shown problems with sampling and choosing the right variables. Some studies proved to be f ruitful in that it factored in relevant psychological concepts that would mediate satisfaction regarding money. Also, it turns out that longitudinal studies are much more informative in knowing the effects of income change on well-being. The research question provided by this paper is relevant to current issues of this topic and to career counseling because it would clarify elements such as ability of retrospection and motivation types to be predictors of inwrought well-being with regard to ones income.