Andrew Gibson, Kieran Francis, Harriet Brown, Emily Williams, Claire Massett and Felicity Lindsay

Research Paper 1

From Wealth to Well-Being? Money matters, but less than people think. Aknin et al. 2009

Research Paper 2

Money and Mental Well-Being: A longitudinal study of medium-sized lottery wins. Gardner et al. 2006

People are obsessed with money

Concern about losing money

More time spent at work

Assume that more money leads to greater level of happiness

Study 1 – To find a link between household income and happiness

Study 2 – To assess how happy participants will be with different levels of income

429 Americans asked to report and predict happiness levels

Part of wider online survey where points could be redeemed for prizes

Asked to rate their life satisfaction on a scale 0-10

Asked to predict life satisfaction of 10 people with different household incomes

Actual and predicted happiness levels for the 10 household income point estimates

Higher levels of income associated with greater level of happiness

Moderate correlation found

Accurate prediction about higher household income being linked to increased happiness

Vastly underestimated the happiness of people earning lower levels of household income

315 Americans from same research pool as used in Study 1

Identical methodology to Study 1, but instead participants were asked to predict how happy THEY would be with different levels of income, before making predictions for others

Predicted Study 2 would mispredict association between money and happiness, whether or not it’s in reference to themselves

Actual and predicted happiness levels for both oneself and another at the 10 household income point estimates

People accurately predicted the emotional benefits of being rich, but vastly overestimated the emotional cost of being poor

Believe money and happiness more tightly linked than in reality, overemphasising the importance of money

People work harder, driven by the fear of loss

People spend more time in the office to get more money – sacrificing family and leisure time

American population only

Surveys attracted certain demographic

No mention of the right to withdraw from the study

May not answer truthfully

Possible other reasons for level of happiness

Previous income was not taken into account

Statistically well-determined link between income and reported wellbeing

Natural experiment using lottery winners’ data

Used a standard mental well-being measure contained in BHPS called the GHQ score

Longitudinal as opposed to cross-sectional study

12 question survey

Psychological health questionnaire (GHQ-12)

33,605 observations

4,822 “Medium winners” / 137 “Bigger winners”

Control group – No win / Medium winners

Experimental group – Bigger winners

Table1 shows the average wins of the groups and the relevant GHQ scores

Table1 shows the average wins of the groups and the relevant GHQ scores

Table1 shows the average wins of the groups and the relevant GHQ scores

Table1 shows the average wins of the groups and the relevant GHQ scores

Gender differences

Demographics don’t matter for big wins

People who have a higher GHQ level were more positively affected by big wins

Evidence is robust

Winning the lottery shows some improvement on mental health

Higher income houses have a lower GHQ after winning the lottery than those from lower income households

Supports evidence of Diener et al. (2002)

No previous knowledge of participants’ wealth

Only UK sample used

Stopped using certain data during study with no stated reason

No mention of ethics

No p value – no test of significance

Lower income households more likely to play lottery

Graphs to demonstrate how the differing range in Y axis values can influence our interpretation of results

Both studies show a very slight link between money and happiness

Both point to other factors having a greater effect on happiness

Both studies use similar research methods

There is an apparent link between money and happiness

Financial resources appeared to act as a mechanism translating life circumstances into life satisfaction (Diener 2002)

People may lie about happiness

Other factors Type of expenditure Dunn et al. Attitude towards money Vohs et al. Status Nettle 2005

Money and happiness appear to link

Not the only cause of happiness

Just because you have money does not mean you will be happy

Aknin, L., Norton, M., & Dunn, E. (2009). From wealth to well-being? Money matters, but less than people think The Journal of Positive Psychology, 4 (6), 523-527.

Diener, E. Biswas-Diener, R. (2002). Will money increase subjective wellbeing? Social Indicators Research 57, 119-169

Dunn, E. Aknin, L. And Norton, M. (2008) Spending Money on Others Promotes Happiness Science 21Vol. 319 no. 5870 pp. 1687-1688 .

Gardner, J. & Oswald, A.J. (2006). Money and mental well-being: A longitudinal study of medium-sized lottery wins. Journal of Health Economics, 26, 49-60.

Johnson, W. , and Krueger, R. F. (2006). How Money Buys Happiness: Genetic and Environmental Processes linking finances and life satisfaction. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 90, 680-691

Kahneman, D., Krueger, A., B.Schkade, D., Schwarz, N. & Stone, A.A. (2006). Would You Be Happier If You Were Richer? A Focusing Illusion Science, 312 (5782), 1908-1910.

Nettle, D., 2005b. Social Gradients in Subjective Wellbeing: Is It Money or Person Control that Matters? Department of Psychology, Brain and Behaviour, University of Newcastle: working paper.

Vohs, K. Mead, N. Goode, M. (2006) The Psychological Consequences of Money Science 17 Vol. 314 no. 5802 1154-1156

Haisley, E., Mostafa, R. and Loewenstein, G. (2008), Subjective relative income and lottery ticket purchases. J. Behav. Decis. Making, 21: 283–295.