Abstract
In pursuit of happiness, individuals often choose activities which may be influenced by their general decision making styles that reflect habitual ways of choosing and making decisions. The present study investigated the associations of such tendencies, namely individuals’ temporal perspectives that included present and future focus, and maximizing, with persons’ orientations to happiness and their relevance for subjective well-being. The obtained results confirmed previous reports indicating the relevance of orientations to happiness for subjective well-being. With respect to the decision making styles, they revealed positive correlations with regard to future focus with orientations to meaning and engagement that were also negatively associated with present focus. In addition, present focus was positively correlated with orientation to pleasure. With respect to maximizing, this decision making style was positively associated with all three orientations. While assessing the relevance of decision making styles for subjective well-being, the regression analyses indicated that higher levels of maximizing directly predicted higher levels of negative affect and lower life satisfaction. Next, mediation and network methodologies revealed significant mediating effects of orientations to meaning and engagement with respect to the relationships between future focus with life satisfaction and positive affect, orientation to meaning with respect to the associations between present focus with life satisfaction and positive affect, and orientation to engagement with respect to the relationships between maximizing with life satisfaction and positive affect. These results extend previous knowledge, indicating the relevance of individuals’ decision making styles for their conceptualizations of happiness, as well as subjective well-being.
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1 Introduction
Is happiness a matter of choice, and if yes, what and how can we choose to make ourselves happy? In recent decades, numerous scientific studies have sought to investigate the sources of human happiness, as well as personal characteristics and behaviors that contribute or hinder such experiences. In doing so, researchers have typically focused on individuals’ subjective well-being, namely their general cognitive evaluations of life quality and salient affective reactions that have been operationalized as life satisfaction, positive affect and negative affect (Chamberlain 1988; Diener 2000, 2009). Scientific interest in this topic is quite understandable, given the high degree of value that individuals tend to place on happiness, as well as its associations with a number of favorable life outcomes that include, e.g., better health, higher wealth and life success (Cohen et al. 2003; Diener and Chan 2011; Diener et al. 1995; Emmons 1986; Frey and Stutzer 2010). Consequently, it is important to better understand the factors that contribute to subjective well-being and ways of improving individuals’ cognitive evaluations of own life and daily affective experiences.
Although numerous attempts have been conducted with the goal of elucidating the potential for increasing happiness, many previous findings suggest that such potential may be somewhat limited. Specifically, it has been demonstrated that subjective well-being is, to a large degree, determined by stabile personal characteristics and that each individual has a genetically determined happiness set point (Fujita and Diener 2005; Lyubomirsky et al. 2005). Thus, although different life circumstances may temporarily influence persons’ affective states and happiness levels, individuals typically return to their stabile set point range (Cummins 2013; Diener et al. 2006; Lyubomirsky et al. 2005), suggesting that life choices and actions only have a limited influence on their subjective well-being. However, different types of intentional behavioral, cognitive or volitional activities may nevertheless alter one’s happiness levels (Emmons and McCullough 2003; Keltner and Bonanno 1997; Lyubomirsky et al. 2005; Sheldon and Houser-Marko 2001), indicating the relevance of personal beliefs, judgments and behaviors for subjective well-being. In accordance with this, Peterson et al. (2005) have demonstrated that individuals’ beliefs regarding different ways of obtaining happiness, i.e., orientations to happiness, are relevant for their life satisfaction. Specifically, the authors have suggested that individuals tend to employ three rather distinct cognitive strategies while pursuing happiness, namely striving towards a life of pleasure, a life of meaning or a life of engagement. Earlier studies have revealed the relevance of these orientations for life satisfaction, positive and negative affect as well as character strengths associated with life satisfaction (Brdar and Kashdan 2010; Peterson et al. 2005, 2007; Vella-Brodrick et al. 2009). Moreover, the validity of the construct of orientations to happiness and its relation to subjective well-being have been confirmed across different cultures (Anić and Tončić 2013; Chan 2009; Chen et al. 2010; Park et al. 2009). Furthermore, the mediating role of orientations to happiness with respect to associations between personality traits and subjective well-being has also previously been proposed (Pollock et al. 2016). Considering the fact that orientations to happiness reflect individuals’ cognitive strategies, namely beliefs regarding potential sources of happiness that influence their actions directed towards increasing own happiness, it is important to further understand their impact on well-being, as well as associations with other cognitive factors that may be of relevance in this context.
Among such cognitive factors, one of the most fundamental capacities whose relevance for subjective well-being may be considered is the individuals’ ability to foresee events that may happen in the future, and their more general capacity for mental time travel (Suddendorf et al. 2009; Suddendorf and Corballis 2007). Although constituting our core cognitive capacity, the ability to consider future outcomes and consequences when making decisions in the present also represents a strong source of individual differences. Whereas some individuals tend to focus primarily on current needs, others are able to better imagine future outcomes for which they are more willing to sacrifice their immediate wishes (Strathman et al. 1994). Although most previous research has focused on investigating the role of considering future consequences for responsible behaviors within different domains (Joireman et al. 2001, 2006, 2008; Kauffman and Husman 2004; Strathman and Joireman 2005; Walker and Tracey 2012), some studies have also indicated the relevance of future orientation for deriving more satisfaction from present goal-oriented actions and positive motivation (Husman and Lens 1999; Husman and Shell 2008; Zaleski 1994). More importantly, future orientation has also been associated with emotional processing and well-being, as mental simulation of the future may aid emotional regulation and result in more efficient coping with problematic situations (Hayes-Roth and Hayes-Roth 1979; Taylor and Schneider 1989). Furthermore, simulating the future reduces individuals’ worries regarding the upcoming events (Brown et al. 2002), whereas reduced levels of future-oriented processing have been associated with depression and anxiety disorders (Miloyan et al. 2013).
Another decision making style (Appelt et al. 2011) reflecting individuals’ dominant approach to decision making situations that may be relevant within the present context includes maximizing. Specifically, it has previously been demonstrated that some individuals, i.e., maximizers, typically aim towards achieving the best possible outcomes, in contrast to satisficers who have a tendency to settle on outcomes that may not be ideal, but satisfy their needs to a less ambitious criterion (Schwartz et al. 2002). Consequently, maximizers are often more willing to sacrifice their current comfort and invest more effort into solving problems and making decisions than satisficers (Iyengar et al. 2006; Nenkov et al. 2008; Roets et al. 2012). Maximizing tendencies have previously been associated with individuals’ well-being, specifically higher regret regarding made decisions, lower happiness and reduced life satisfaction (Schwartz et al. 2002). This may be explained if we consider the fact that maximizers tend to have overly high personal standards, and consequently often face situations in which decision outcomes do not meet their unrealistic expectations, leading to regret and dissatisfaction (Roets et al. 2012).
2 Overview of the Present Study
The present study investigated the relationships among subjective well-being, orientations to happiness and decision making styles that included individuals’ tendency to be more oriented towards the present or the future and maximizing. In doing so, we first expected that our findings would replicate previous results indicating the relevance of orientations to happiness for subjective well-being. Next, we assumed that the explored decision making styles would be associated with the way individuals conceptualize happiness that is reflected in their orientations to happiness. Specifically, it could be posited that individuals oriented primarily towards the present would be more focused on current needs and inclined to endorse pleasure as the main path to achieving happiness, in contrast to those oriented towards the future who would show a higher propensity towards achieving a meaningful or engaged life. In addition, it could be suggested that maximizing would be associated with a less pronounced orientation to pleasure. Finally, we expected that the investigated decision making styles would also be relevant for individuals’ well-being. Specifically, we hypothesized that the ability to detach from the present and consider future consequences would be positively associated with individuals’ life satisfaction. Furthermore, we hypothesized that maximizing would be related to lower life satisfaction and the propensity to experience more negative affect. In addition, based on previous reports (Pollock et al. 2016), we hypothesized that the impact of decision making styles on subjective well-being indices would be mediated by individuals’ orientations to happiness.
3 Method
3.1 Sample and Procedure
A snowball sample of 330 participants (113 (34.2%) male and 217 (65.8%) female; average age 26.2, SD = 10.44) participated in this study. The participants were recruited by students enrolled into a class dedicated to decision making at the University of Split, Croatia and approached by the interviewers at their homes where they completed the prepared instruments.
3.2 Instruments
Within the present study, the participants completed the following instruments: Consideration of Future Consequences Scale (Strathman et al. 1994), Short Maximizing Scale (Nenkov et al. 2008), Orientations to Happiness Scale (Peterson et al. 2005), Satisfaction with Life Scale (Diener et al. 1985) and Bradburn Scale of Psychological Well-Being (Bradburn 1969). Descriptive properties and reliabilities of all utilized scales are presented in Table 1.
Consideration of Future Consequences Scale (Strathman et al. 1994) is an instrument used for assessing the extent to which individuals focus on short-term or long-term consequences of their actions. It comprises 12 items and the participants’ task was to rate whether each item is characteristic for themselves using a 5-point Likert type scale (1–extremely uncharacteristic; 5–extremely characteristic). It has previously been demonstrated that this instrument includes two distinct subscales (Joireman et al. 2008), one that reflects individuals’ orientation towards the future and another that reflects their orientation towards the present moment. Consequently, within the present study we calculated separate scores for these scales, namely the Present Focus scale that comprises 7 items (e.g., I only act to satisfy immediate concerns, figuring the future will take care of itself), and the Future Focus scale that comprises the remaining 5 items (e.g., I am willing to sacrifice my immediate happiness or well-being in order to achieve future outcomes). The scores were calculated as a mean value of all included scale items.
Short Maximizing Scale (Nenkov et al. 2008) is an instrument developed for assessing individuals’ decision making tendencies that distinguishes between two approaches, maximizing and satisficing. Whereas maximizing is characteristic for individuals who strive towards optimizing the decision making process and making the best possible decisions, satisficing refers to a tendency to settle on compromising decisions that satisfy less ambitious criteria. This scale consists of 6 items (e.g., No matter what I do, I have the highest standards for myself) that the participants rated on a 7-point Likert-type scale (1–strongly disagree; 7–strongly agree). Higher scores on this scale that were calculated as a mean value of all included scale items reflect higher maximization tendencies.
Orientations to Happiness Scale (Peterson et al. 2005) is a questionnaire designed for assessing three different orientations to happiness that overall comprises 18 items. Among these, 6 items are used for measuring the orientation to pleasure (e.g., Life is too short to postpone the pleasures it can provide), 6 items for measuring the orientation to meaning (e.g., I have a responsibility to make the world a better place) and 6 items for measuring the orientation to flow or engagement (e.g., I seek out situations that challenge my skills and abilities.). The participants’ task was to rate how well each item describes themselves using a 7-point scale (1–very much unlike me; 7–very much like me). The scores on all three subscales were calculated as a mean value of all included scale items.
Satisfaction with Life Scale (Diener et al. 1985) is an instrument designed for assessing individuals’ global cognitive judgments of life satisfaction. It comprises 5 items (e.g. In most ways my life is close to my ideal) that the participants rated using a 7-point scale (1–strongly disagree; 7–strongly agree). The scores on this scale were calculated as a mean value of all included scale items.
Bradburn Scale of Psychological Well-Being (Bradburn 1969) is a scale that overall comprises 10 items used for assessing two types of individuals’ affective experiences. Among these, 5 items are used for assessing the positive affect (e.g. During the past few weeks did you feel pleased about having accomplished something?) and 5 items for assessing the negative affect component (e.g. During the past few weeks did you feel upset because someone criticized you?). Within this instrument, participants’ task was to report whether they had felt certain emotions in the past few weeks using binary responses (yes or no). The scores on these scales were calculated as a sum of all included scale items.
3.3 Data Analysis
Data analysis was aimed at exploring the associations between orientations to happiness and well-being indices, as well as the relevance of decision making styles for individuals’ orientations to happiness and well-being. After the descriptive statistical analyses, correlation analyses were performed in order to explore the first-order correlations among all explored variables. Next, three hierarchical regression analyses were conducted with the aim of determining the contributions of decision making styles and orientations to happiness to the three investigated well-being indices. In order to explore these effects in more detail and address the postulated hypotheses regarding the mediating effects of orientations to happiness with respect to the associations among decision making styles and subjective well-being, mediation analyses were performed. Given the complexity of the obtained findings, we then used network methodology in order to both visualize and infer the strength and importance of the revealed relationships among explored variables.
4 Results
Correlation analyses were conducted as the first step in investigating the relations among the explored variables. With respect to the associations among orientations to happiness and well-being indices, the obtained results indicated that both life satisfaction and positive affect were positively correlated with all three orientations, whereas negative affect was negatively correlated with orientation to engagement. When considering the relationships among decision making styles and orientations to happiness, the results indicated that present focus was positively correlated with orientation to pleasure, and negatively associated with orientations to meaning and engagement. In contrast, future focus was positively correlated with orientations to meaning and engagement. Finally, maximizing was positively correlated with all three orientations to happiness. With respect to the associations among decision making styles and well-being indices, the results revealed a positive correlation between individuals’ tendency to consider potential consequences of current actions with life satisfaction and positive affect that was also negatively correlated with the tendency to focus on the present moment while making decisions. Furthermore, maximizing was positively correlated with both positive and negative affect. The remaining correlations are presented in Table 2.
Next, the relationships among the investigated variables were explored in more detail using hierarchical regression analyses (Table 3). Three separate analyses were conducted, using life satisfaction, positive and negative affect as criteria. Decision making styles were entered as potential predictors in the first step of all analyses, whereas orientations to happiness were entered in the second step. The obtained results indicated that the utilized predictors explained the highest amount of variance (25.8%) of life satisfaction. Next, 17.4% of variance was explained with respect to positive, and only 6.6% of variance with regard to negative affect. With respect to the contributions of orientations to happiness to well-being indices, all orientations contributed to positive affect, whereas orientations to meaning and engagement were revealed as significant predictors of life satisfaction. Finally, only orientation to engagement significantly contributed to negative affect, with lower levels of this orientation predicting higher negative affect. A somewhat complex pattern of results emerged with respect to the contributions of decision making styles to well-being indices. With respect to temporal perspectives, in the first step of the analyses future focus was identified as a significant predictor of life satisfaction and positive affect, but lost its significance in the second step. On the other hand, maximizing emerged as a significant predictor of negative affect in the first step of the analyses, whereas after the second step it was revealed as a significant predictor of negative affect and life satisfaction. As we hypothesized that the contributions of decision making styles on subjective well-being indices would be mostly indirect, we then conducted mediation analyses.
Next, we explored the potential mediating role of orientations to happiness with regard to the relationships between present focus, future focus and maximizing with life satisfaction, positive affect and negative affect (Table 4). Overall, nine mediation analysis were conducted because, for every relationship between decision making styles and well-being indices, all three orientations to happiness were included together in the mediation analysis. We utilized the bootstraping method developed by Preacher and Hayes (Hayes 2009; Preacher and Hayes 2004, 2008) for testing mediation, as previous approaches related to this analysis have been criticized for their underlying assumptions and inability to directly evaluate potential mediation (MacKinnon et al. 2002). Within this method the mediating effects were calculated using 1.000 samples of the original size, together with the corrected and accelerated 95% confidence intervals. When interpreting the obtained results, mediation is considered significant if the lower and upper boundaries of these intervals do not contain zero. With respect to temporal perspectives, the obtained results revealed that orientations to meaning and engagement mediated the associations between present focus and future focus with life satisfaction, as well as the effects of future focus on positive affect. Furthermore, all three orientations to happiness mediated the relationship between present focus and positive affect. Concerning maximizing, its associations with life satisfaction and positive affect were mediated by orientations to meaning and engagement, whereas the orientation to engagement also mediated its relation with negative affect.
However, most of the obtained mediating effects were small in magnitude, indicating a possibility that some of them were obtained purely by chance. In order to minimize the risk of false positives and not to lose the power using the Bonferroni correction, we utilized the network methodology (Costantini et al. 2015). Using this methodology, it is possible to present a network structure in which variables are represented by nodes, whereas any of the relationships between the variables, after controlling for all the other nodes in the network, are represented by edges. This way all the interactions among the variables can be visualized, along with their directions and magnitudes. Customarily, positive relationships are represented using green edges while negative relationships are indicated with red edges. Furthermore, thickness of the edges is used for showing the strength of associations between the nodes, with the thicker edges suggesting stronger associations between two nodes. Typically, correlations or partial correlations are used as indicators of such associations. However, using both of these types of information results in fully connected networks with edges that represent even very small and negligible relationships (Costantini et al. 2015). A procedure that can be utilized to control for this effect is called the LASSO penalization. This procedure causes the small relationships to shrink to zero which not only results in a sparser, more parsimonious network, but also excludes spurious relationships that could arise due to chance or multiple testing (Kossakowski et al. 2016). Thus, if an edge is present in a LASSO network one can reasonably trust that there really exist a relationship between the variables in question (Costantini et al. 2015).
The graphical representation of a LASSO network with the variables used in this study is presented in Fig. 1. It can be seen that some of the previously described mediation effects, although statistically significant, are not presented in the network. With respect to life satisfaction as an outcome, although orientation to engagement was previously revealed as a statistically significant mediator of the relationship between present focus and life satisfaction, such connection is absent from the network. In other words, there is no edge that directly connects present focus with orientation to engagement, and then continues to life satisfaction. Another statistically significant mediator absent from the network is the orientation to meaning mediating the relationship between maximizing and life satisfaction. Thus, with regard to life satisfaction serving as a criterion, in the network structure the mediating effects of orientations to meaning and engagement were revealed with respect to its relationship with future focus. Furthermore, orientation to meaning mediated its relationship with present focus whereas orientation to engagement mediated its association with maximizing.
With respect to positive affect as the criterion, the network structure suggests a similar pattern that was revealed earlier, namely the existence of the mediating effects of orientations to meaning and engagement with respect to its relationship with future focus, the mediating effect of orientation to meaning with regard to the association with present focus and the mediating effects of orientation to engagement with regard to the association with maximizing. However, there was no direct mediating effect of the orientation to engagement with respect to the relationship between present focus and the aforementioned outcome. Furthermore, there is no mediation of the orientation to meaning on the relationship between maximizing and positive affect. Finally, the only statistically significant mediator of the relationships between decision styles and negative affect, namely the effect of maximizing via orientation to engagement, is also absent from the network, suggesting no mediating effects with respect to the relationships among decision making styles and negative affect. As the network methodology, specifically LASSO penalization, was used mainly to control for the spurious connections among variables, only those mediating effects that appear in the network will be discussed.
5 Discussion
The present study investigated the relevance of individuals’ decision making styles that reflect habitual ways of choosing and making decisions, as well as orientations to happiness for subjective well-being. The obtained results confirmed previous reports indicating the importance of orientations to happiness for subjective well-being, and extended them by demonstrating the role of two temporal perspectives, present and future focus, as well as maximizing, in understanding orientations to happiness and well-being.
5.1 The Relevance of Orientations to Happiness for Subjective Well-Being
The results of the present study are in general accordance with earlier findings related to the role of orientations to happiness in subjective well-being. Specifically, life satisfaction and positive affect were positively correlated with three orientations to happiness that include orientations to meaning, pleasure and engagement, whereas negative affect correlated negatively with the orientation to engagement. The results of the hierarchical regression analyses indicated that all orientations to happiness contributed to positive affect, whereas orientations to meaning and engagement significantly predicted life satisfaction. These findings are in agreement with earlier reports indicating stronger influences of orientations to meaning and engagement for life satisfaction when compared to the orientation to pleasure (Brdar and Anić 2010; Peterson et al. 2005; Pollock et al. 2016; Vella-Brodrick et al. 2009). In the present study negative affect was only associated with lower levels of orientation to engagement, which also resonates with previous reports indicating the lowest relevance of orientations to happiness for negative affect (Pollock et al. 2016; Vella-Brodrick et al. 2009).
5.2 Associations Between Decision Making Styles and Orientations to Happiness
With respect to the associations between decision making styles and orientations to happiness, the obtained results indicated that persons’ tendency to be oriented towards the future and consider expected consequences of current actions positively correlated with orientations to meaning and engagement. This suggests that individuals oriented towards the future tend to view their current sacrifices as an investment into the future that allows them to achieve more meaningful long-term goals instead of impulsively fulfilling current desires and needs. This confirms previous reports indicating that individuals with a more pronounced future time perspective recognize the instrumentality of present behaviors for the future, resulting in their more vigorous and engaged commitment to present obligations (Simons et al. 2004). They also show higher motivation for engaging in chosen, even difficult, present behaviors, resulting in higher achievement and more beneficial future outcomes (Kauffman and Husman 2004). Consequently, these individuals are more prone towards pursuing a life of meaning or engagement that may not be achieved by focusing on pleasures experienced in the present, but by realizing important long-term goals or by developing and engaging all of their abilities and virtues in chosen activities. In contrast, individuals oriented primarily towards present needs and desires, who don’t see the value in worrying about the future, show lower orientations to engagement and meaning, but a higher orientation to pleasure, as indicated by the positive correlations between present focus and the orientation to pleasure, and its negative correlations with orientations to meaning and engagement.
Next, individuals’ tendency to maximize during decision making was positively correlated with all three orientations to happiness. This indicates that maximizers, similar to persons more concerned with the future, tend to develop orientations to meaning and engagement, which resonates with their general tendency to achieve more and obtain the best possible outcomes (Schwartz et al. 2002). The positive correlation between maximizing and present focus indicates that such tendencies are not restricted only to future opportunities, but also to present situations that may provide pleasurable rewards. Thus, maximizers are dedicated towards dealing with present challenges in ways that will result in maximum gains, regardless of whether these occur in the future or in the present (Iyengar et al. 2006; Nenkov et al. 2008; Roets et al. 2012). Consequently, they strive towards maximum gains in all aspects of their lives, as indicated by them being oriented towards achieving as much as possible in life, regardless of whether this is reflected in a more meaningful, engaged or pleasurable life.
5.3 The Direct and Indirect Associations Between Decision Making Styles and Subjective Well-Being
The obtained results suggest rather complex patterns of associations between decision making tendencies and subjective well-being. First, they indicate that individuals’ temporal perspective may indirectly impact their subjective well-being, which extends earlier findings indicating the relevance of considering future consequences for beneficial decision making strategies and self-regulation (Joireman et al. 2008; Strathman and Joireman 2005). Specifically, it has previously been demonstrated that individuals who focus on the future while making choices in the present make decisions with favorable long-term outcomes, which may result in their greater life satisfaction. In accordance with this, consideration of future consequences has previously been revealed as a significant predictor of students’ satisfaction with one aspect of their lives, namely their college majors (Bubic 2015). Furthermore, Taylor and Schneider (1989) have previously demonstrated that mentally simulating the future benefits individuals’ emotion regulation and emotional coping, which may also lead to higher subjective well-being. Resonating with this conclusion, associations between depression and reduced levels of future-oriented processing have also been suggested (Miloyan et al. 2013). The present findings extend this knowledge by showing that individuals’ future time perspective positively correlated with life satisfaction and positive affect that was also negatively correlated with their tendency to be primarily focused on the present moment. However, as suggested by non-significant direct effects and significant indirect effects obtained in the conducted regression, mediation and network analyses, the influence of future focus on these criteria is exerted exclusively through orientations to meaning and engagement. It seems that individuals more oriented towards the future seek their happiness mostly through meaningful and engaging activities and efforts, which in turn increase their subjective well-being, both in terms of life satisfaction and positive affect. On the other hand, being oriented towards the present is associated with positive affect, and this association is realized through the mediating role of orientation to pleasure that increases positive affect. Furthermore, associations between present focus with life satisfaction and positive affect were mediated by orientation to meaning, indicating that those oriented towards present needs and pleasures are not inclined to search for deeper meaning in their life, which then reduces not only their long-term life satisfaction but also the propensity to experience positive affect in the present moment. Although, in accordance with the negative relation between these variables revealed in the correlation analysis, an additional direct connection between present focus and positive affect was also revealed in the network, it was not strong enough to reach statistical significance and should be assessed in more detail in future studies. Finally, neither present nor future focus demonstrated a direct influence on the negative affect component of subjective well-being. Similarly, the obtained results did not reveal any of the three orientations to happiness as significant mediators of the relationships between present or future focus and negative affect.
Next, the results of the present study indicate that maximizing correlated positively with both positive and negative affect. Although this finding may seem somewhat counterintuitive, it can be explained by a somewhat contradictory nature of maximizing. Specifically, as maximizing reflects our constant striving for best possible solutions, it is often associated with formulating more favorable expectations and experiencing positive objective decision outcomes (Iyengar et al. 2006) that may lead to positive affect. However, people prone towards maximizing also often experience difficulties in making decisions and show critical attitudes towards their choices, leading them to experience certain types of negative emotions such as regret (Nenkov et al. 2008; Roets et al. 2012; Schwartz et al. 2002). The present findings also reveal associations between maximizing and subjective well-being indices, suggesting that their relationships are mediated by orientations to happiness. Specifically, they demonstrate that orientation to engagement mediated the relation between maximizing and positive aspects of well-being, indicating that maximizers experience more life satisfaction and positive affect due to being more oriented towards engagement. However, the relation between maximizing and life satisfaction is twofold: whereas maximizing seems to increase life satisfaction through increasing orientation to engagement, at the same time it has a negative direct influence on it, as suggested by the results of the regression analysis. Specifically, maximizing decreases life satisfaction when controlling for the contribution of orientation to engagement, which resonates with previous findings indicating negative associations between maximizing and happiness (Roets et al. 2012; Schwartz et al. 2002). Finally, within the present study maximizing was revealed as the only significant predictor of negative affect which may be interpreted in light of previous findings indicating maximizers’ increased sensitivity to failure that can be facilitated by their tendencies to set unrealistically high standards and underappreciate suboptimal outcomes (Schwartz et al. 2002).
Overall, the present findings demonstrate that certain decision making styles representing habitual ways of approaching problem or decision circumstances also become reflected in individuals’ conceptualizations of happiness, or their ideas regarding potential actions that could make them happy and satisfied in life. Specifically, general decision making styles impact some aspects of individuals’ inclinations to pursue happiness through specific ways that in turn influence their subjective well-being, similar to the previously established mediating role of orientations to happiness with respect to the associations between extraversion and subjective affect (Pollock et al. 2016). Our results suggest that their influence is complex, and was somewhat clarified with the use of network methodology as part of the conducted data analysis. In addition to the previously discussed relationships among specific pairs and small groups of variables, one more aspect of the revealed network should be discussed, as its structure seems to imply one interesting possibility. Namely, it may be possible to suggest the existence of two sub-networks corresponding to two different historical and scientific views of happiness. The first sub-network has orientation to pleasure as a central node connecting the present focus, maximizing and, to a lesser extent, orientation to engagement. This interrelationship between variables could broadly correspond to the tradition that views happiness as a consequence of maximizing pleasure and minimizing pain, namely the hedonistic tradition of happiness. The doctrine of hedonism, well represented by the saying “don’t worry, be happy” (Peterson et al. 2005), is characterized by living a life aimed at experiencing pleasurable events, being focused on the present moment and striving to achieve the best possible outcomes for oneself. In contrast to this hedonistic view stands the eudaimonic concept of happiness. This view emphasizes that, in order to live a truly happy life, one should develop what is best within oneself and then use these skills and talents in the service of greater goods (Peterson et al. 2005). Thus, the sub-network connecting the concepts of living a life oriented towards meaning and engaging oneself in purposeful activities that result in greater satisfaction with one’s life may well be representative of this view of happiness. The present analysis, although brief and not able to capture the full complexity of associations among the explored constructs, serves as an illustration of the benefits of using the network methodology in analyzing different sorts of phenomena. Namely, it allows the researchers to go beyond the data by examining the interrelations of various variables and uncovering the ways in which the variables relate to each other and form meaningful clusters. It remains to be seen in future studies whether the present two sub-networks will prove to be persistent and robust across different samples.
5.4 Limitations of the Present Study and Directions for Future Research
In interpreting the results obtained in the present investigation, it is important to consider that this study represents a correlational exploration whose results cannot provide decisive information regarding potential causality relationships among the explored variables. Although in our investigation we assumed a certain direction of causality, the cross-sectional methodology used in this study precludes us from positing clear causal relationships among the investigated variables, as longitudinal studies would be more appropriate for reaching such conclusions (Preacher 2015). Therefore, it is possible that influences of different directionality are also possible. For example, it may be conceived that individuals develop certain orientations to happiness that then color the way they habitually make everyday decisions, e.g., those who are oriented towards enjoying daily pleasures become more focused on short-term goals in other areas of their lives, or those who seek long-term meaningful fulfilment learn to focus on the future and attempt to achieve their maximum regardless of the context. Furthermore, it is possible, or even more likely, that some additional factors influence both individuals’ cognitive styles and orientations to happiness. Among these, Pollock and colleagues (2016) have recently suggested that life history may provide such influence (Figueredo et al. 2006).
Furthermore, it is important to emphasize that our findings are based on self-report data that, in addition to providing limited insights into the potential causal relationships, may be associated with a number of biases (McDonald 2008; Paulhus and Vazire 2007). Next, a snowball sample of participants was interviewed within the present study and as such may not be representative for the whole population. Moreover, our sample included predominately young adults and more female than male participants. With regard to age, this suggests that the obtained findings may primarily be relevant for the younger adult population, as previous studies have indicated that changes in well-being associated with aging may be related to changes in individuals’ orientations to happiness as well as time perspective (Carstensen 2006). Furthermore, although most previous studies did not reveal the existence of prominent gender differences with respect to subjective well-being (Diener et al. 1995; Lučev and Tadinac 2008; Penezić 2006), more gender-balanced samples should be included in future research. Finally, only Croatian nationals participated in the study, indicating that future studies should explore the cross-cultural stability of the presented findings.
Overall, when considering our findings that suggest high complexity of relations among the explored variables, as well as their associations with other constructs that were not addressed in the present study, future studies will greatly benefit from extending our investigation and relating the explored variables to other potentially relevant phenomena. For example, the impact of temporal perspective and maximizing on individuals’ conceptualizations of happiness and well-being should be colored by the types of expectations they hold for the near or distant future, namely their optimism or pessimism (Scheier and Carver 1993), as well as personality traits and emotional competence. Similarly, whereas in this investigation we focused on the role of decision making styles in explaining happiness or subjective well-being, a construct originating primarily from the hedonistic tradition of studying well-being (Ryan and Deci 2001), future studies should also consider their contributions to the eudemonistic aspects of well-being for which some decision making styles, especially temporal perspectives, may be more relevant. Therefore, the present findings should be extended by future studies that will allow their more comprehensive integration into the existing knowledge regarding the antecedents and consequences of well-being. These studies could also focus on developing and testing interventions aimed at altering ways individuals seek happiness in their daily lives, and applying these while taking into consideration individuals’ habitual decision making approaches and other cognitive factors.
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Bubić, A., Erceg, N. The Role of Decision Making Styles in Explaining Happiness. J Happiness Stud 19, 213–229 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-016-9816-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-016-9816-z