The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Secret of happiness
As the latest UK life satisfaction statistics are published. Abertay University's Dr Kate Smith tells Michael Alexander: 'don't fret it'
Find happiness in the small things Dr Kate Smith
If the headlines are to be believed, then it has been a year dominated by the uncertainties of Brexit, the election of Donald Trump as US President, the fortunes of new Prime Minister Theresa May, terror attacks on British civilians and warnings of global catastrophe from climate change or nuclear Armageddon.
But according to figures released by the Office for National Statistics, average ratings of life satisfaction in the UK have marginally increased during the year ending June.
The findings – the first to present a full year of personal well-being data since the UK narrowly voted to exit the European Union – reveal that improvements in areas such as life satisfaction and happiness were driven by England, where average ratings across all areas improved.
Variations were reported across the UK, however, with people in Northern Ireland reporting the highest levels of personal well-being, while residents in Scotland were said to be the most anxious and the least happy.
The data were based on a survey of 100,000 adult UK residents who were asked to answer the following on a scale of nought to 10 (nought being ‘not at all’ and 10 being ‘completely’): Overall, how satisfied are you with your life nowadays? Overall, to what extent do you feel the things you do in your life are worthwhile? Overall, how happy did you feel yesterday? Overall, how anxious did you feel yesterday?
The average ratings at the end of June were: 7.7 out of 10 for life satisfaction; 7.9 out of 10 for feeling worthwhile; 7.5 out of 10 for happiness and 2.9 out of 10 for anxiety.
The ONS statistical bulletin suggests possible social and economic factors that might help explain the results.
Dr Kate Smith, academic curriculum manager within the School of Social & Health Sciences at Abertay University in Dundee, co-runs the Tayside Centre for Counselling.
She takes the ONS findings with a “pinch of salt”, as the questions are so broad-based and “don’t reflect some key aspects of how people evaluate themselves and our own sense of wellbeing”.
“It’s important to think about how we decide if we are happy and contented, and this survey doesn’t really do that,” she says.
“For example, we live in a very affluent society and obviously people do have financial challenges. But it’s all relative and things could actually be a lot worse. When you get to that kind of place within a society, usually it’s not the fundamental things like ‘are people really hungry or are they physically in danger or are they at risk of their lives?’ Actually, what happens is that we start to evaluate our lives in terms of what other people around us have.”
Dr Smith said the other aspect not well reflected in the survey is that expectations are often guided by what people see on social media and television.
She says that once the fundamental needs of society are met, the relationship between wealth and happiness completely falls away and other things become more important.
“If you imagine a graph that has happiness on the Y axis and wealth on the X axis, you find that happiness will grow with wealth until a point when you have all your fundamental needs met,” she says.
However, she wouldn’t go as far as to say that people should not be ambitious to be happy.
“My mother always said that the ‘secret to happiness is a good sense of humour and a short memory’ – she was probably right!” she laughs.
“However, I’m not saying don’t be ambitious. It’s about people managing their relationship with ambition. Don’t be put off if you don’t get what you want.
“Find happiness in the small things. Every day you can find something to be happy about, whether it’s going outside and getting a breath of fresh air or making a phone call to a friend.
“And the big things? If they come or they don’t come – don’t fret it. That would be my advice!