Schwartz PowerPoint - Positive Psychology Center

The “Official Syllogism”
• More freedom means more well being
• More choice means more freedom
• More choice means more well being

Consumer Choice

“Patient autonomy”
Health care:
Direct marketing of drugs

Physical appearance

Work

Liberal arts curriculum

Close relationships

Identity

Is this good news or bad news?
YES!

What Too Much Choice Does:
Paralysis
• Buying jam
• 401(k) investing

What Too Much Choice Does:
Satisfaction
• Regret and anticipated regret
• Opportunity costs

Offer participants $2 or a good pen:
75% choose pen
Offer participants $2, or 1 good pen, or
2 cheaper pens:
45% choose either pen

Everything suffers from
comparison

Opportunity costs and
college graduates

From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful
future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home
and children, and another fig was a famous poet, and another fig was a
brilliant professor…and another fig was Europe and Africa and South
America…and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and
beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn’t quite make
out.
I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death,
just because I couldn’t make up my mind which of the figs I would
choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant
losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to
wrinkle and go black, and one by one, they plopped to the ground at my
feet.
—Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar

What Too Much Choice Does:
Satisfaction
• Regret and anticipated regret
• Opportunity costs
• Escalation of expectations

What Too Much Choice Does:
Satisfaction
• Regret and anticipated regret
• Opportunity costs
• Escalation of expectations
• Self blame

Maximizing and Satisficing

Correlates of Maximization
Negative
Happiness
Optimism
Satisfaction with
life
Positive
Regret
Perfectionism
Depression
Self esteem

Career Decisions of College Seniors
(Iyengar, Wells, & Schwartz, Psych Science, 2006)
1. Difficulty of decision
2. Desired number of options
3. How they did
4. How they felt

Maximizers
• Consider more jobs
• Want more options
• Get $7K more in starting salary

Maximizers are...
More:
Pessimistic
Anxious
Stressed
Worried
Tired
Overwhelmed
Depressed
Regretful
Disappointed
Less:
Content
Optimistic
Elated
Excited
Happy

Maximizing, Satisficing, and
College Choice

How Choice Can Be Good and
Bad

+
0
_
Number of Choices

+
0
_
Number of Choices

+
0
_
Number of Choices

The Choices Worth Having

What Really Makes People
Happy
Love and Work (Freud)

Love and Work and Positive
Psychology:
Authentic happiness requires meaning
and engagement

Meaning and Engagement in
Work:
“Jobs,” “Careers,” and “Callings”
(Wrzesniewski, McCauley, Rozin, & Schwartz, Journal of Research in
Personality, 1997)

Job
• Work for pay
• Necessity of life
• Would stop in a minute
• Would do something else if given a chance
• Anticipates weekends
• Eager to retire
• Wouldn’t encourage friends or kids

Career
• Enjoys work
• Expects to move on to something better
• Goals for future trajectory
• Can’t wait to get a promotion

Calling
• Work is one of the most important parts of life
• Pleased to be in this line of work
• Work is a vital part of identity
• Takes work home and on vacations
• Friends are from the workplace
• Belongs to several organizations and clubs relating to the
work
• Work makes the world a better place
• Encourage friends and children to do this work
• Not particularly looking forward to retirement

What Job Orientation Affects
• Job performance
• Job satisfaction
• Life satisfaction
• Physical health

What Creating a “Calling”
Requires
• A sense of organizational purpose
• A sense of partnership
• A large degree of discretion and
autonomy
An example: Hospital cleaners

Meaning and Engagement in
Social Relations

The Virtues
• Wisdom and knowledge
• Courage
• Humanity and love
• Justice
• Temperance
• Transcendence

Some Character Strengths
• Open-mindedness
• Ingenuity
• Social intelligence
• Kindness and generosity
• Fairness
• Self control
• Leadership
• Humility
• Bravery
• Persistence
• Integrity
• Honesty
• Authenticity
• Appreciation of excellence
• Prudence
• Purpose
• Loyalty

What Positive Psychology Tells
Us to Do
• Identify “signature strengths”
• Develop them
• The more developed they are, the
better

Aristotle’s View
• You need all the virtues
• More is not always better than less: the
“mean”

The “Mean” between…
• Prudence and bravery
• Loyalty and authenticity
• Leadership and humility
• Open-mindedness and loyalty
• Honesty and kindness

Aristotle’s View
• You need all the virtues
• More is not always better than less: the
“mean”
• Practical wisdom is the “master virtue”

Why You Need Practical
Wisdom

Two Examples
• “How do I look?”
• “How should I grade?”

Why You Need Practical
Wisdom
• Relevance
• Conflict
• Specificity

“One can not love humanity;
one can only love people.”
—Graham Greene

Two Key Things about Love and
Work
• Both require choice (these are the choices
worth having)
• Both constrain choice