Can you measure happiness?

Happiness is a very common emotion found in most creatures that gives positive messages to your brain. It can range from things like pride to contentment to overwhelming joy. A lot of people have strong variation as to what makes them 'happy' , which is frequently called a 'humour sense' . This means that some people prefer dad jokes (e.g., Knock knock jokes), whilst some people prefer randomness, as it makes them laugh due to having no relation to the current situation. A sense of humor is so varied amongst humans that some people even laugh about typically more serious themes such as death or pain. Humans also naturally feel happy at someone else's misfortune, even if it feels wrong to say. We all laugh when someone gets a bad mark on a test or trips over a small rock and drops their papers, or even fails a trick that they have been practising. In conclusion, happiness is a pleasant emotion that has extremely big dissimilarity in most creatures.

Happiness is a very common emotion found in most creatures that gives positive messages to your brain. It can range from things like pride to contentment to overwhelming joy. A lot of people have a strong variation as to what makes them 'happy ' , which is frequently called a 'humour sense ' . This means that some people prefer dad jokes (e.g., Knock knock jokes), whilst some people prefer randomness, as it makes them laugh due to having no relation to the current situation. A sense of humour is so varied amongst humans that some people even laugh about typically more serious themes such as death or pain. Humans also naturally feel happy at someone else ' s misfortune, even if it feels wrong to say. We all laugh when someone gets a bad mark on a test or trips over a small rock and drops their papers, or even fails a trick that they have been practising. In conclusion, happiness is a pleasant emotion that has extremely big dissimilarity in most creatures. Signs of happiness have many variations. When people smile, you can see that they are happy. People not only smile with their mouths but also with their eyes. Laughing is the best way to tell if someone is truly happy. When people smile, creases form around their eyes, which can be used to tell if someone is really smiling. Scientists have done studies that show the effects of happiness in the brain. When you are happy, dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin, and endorphin levels rise. It is a sign of happiness when these chemicals are activated. Until now, surveys about happiness have been almost non-existent, so, almost no-one has measured happiness, which is quite unusual. It has almost exclusively been done by asking survey questions about self-perceived happiness, instead of happiness as a whole.

In conclusion

Over the years, many people have argued about how we should be measuring happiness. In 2008, Denmark was ranked as the 'happiest country in the world' along with Norway and Finland. But how did they measure it? Is this a good way to measure it? This was measured in 6 ways, and Denmark was top in ALL of them, the categories were: income, healthy life expectancy, social support, freedom, trust, and generosity. These are quite wide subjects but there are also other things that may make us happy, such as love, health, and surroundings. Therefore, there may not be a set way to measure happiness, as everyone finds happiness in different things, one person may find happiness from the one they love, whereas another may find it in them not having love and being free from the constraints of family. It has been found that certain factors towards happiness can be measured, but overall happiness is extremely different, and people measure their happiness in completely different ways. Even though there is a scientific side to happiness, the emotional side is what really matters, and even the smallest little wins can mean a lot to some people. Emotions in general fluctuate all the time, and therefore measurements cannot be permanent even if they were completely accurate.

By Aimee Nelson, Arjun Pandurengan, Isobel Turnbull, Katie Harvey.