What is the key to happiness? It’s a question that has plagued mankind for centuries. Some might say it’s all about having money, while others believe it’s more to do with finding your soulmate.
But now, we may have finally cracked the code. Experts suggest they’ve found one of the most important factors to help you flourish in life – and it’s not about day-to-day events.
“It turns out people’s life satisfaction is even more about their personality than we thought,” Dr René Mõttus, lead researcher at the University of Edinburgh, unveiled. “Personality tends to be stable, gradually shaped by a mix of thousands of experiences and genetic factors. So, the more satisfaction is about personality, the less it is expected to react to life’s ebb and flow.”
As part of their research, scientists examined the happiness of more than 20,000 individuals based on numerous different factors.
This included their job, finances, health, where they lived, relationships and even how they looked. To make sure the results were as accurate as possible, the team also spoke to people who knew the volunteers well.
Overall, they found that a massive 80 per cent of differences in people’s happiness were linked to certain personality traits. And it’s bad news for introverts, as the data showed that happier people tended to be more outgoing and decisive.
Dr Mõttus continued: “Broadly speaking, more satisfied people were more emotionally stable, extraverted and conscientious. But more specifically, those satisfied with their life felt understood, excited and decisive, while less satisfied people felt envious, bored, used, unable, and unrewarded.”
Although the studied primarily focused on Estonian adults, results were the same across a range of nationalities and groups of people. Satisfaction was also show to fluctuate throughout time across participants, though it would generally return to a more consistent baseline.
A look back at data from ten years prior supports these findings too, suggesting that the link between personality traits and happiness is robust over time. This challenges previous academic assumptions that may have downplayed the significance of personality in determining happiness.
Dr Mottus emphasised, “This does not mean that experiences cannot have lasting influences on life satisfaction,” Dr Mõttus stressed. “But when experiences do matter, they have to shape people much more generally than simply making them more or less satisfied with life. This takes time and doesn’t happen too often.”