Brianna Coyle

Shelby Stanard

ENG 1201:5B4

2021, July 17

Literature Review

Have you ever thought to yourself, “Am I happy?” Hopefully you are, but how can you tell. Or

more importantly, how can you prove that you are happy. Everyone can experience happiness in multiple

different forms. Different things make different people happy, and others do not always enjoy what

someone else does. My question for my research essay is, “How can someone accomplish living the life

that they want to, and are you currently living a life that you enjoy?”

Happiness has had a major decline since the early 1990’s. When the United States had an

economy boost in 2006 that ended the Great Recession, they thought that would help increase the data of

how people felt and if they were happy or not (The Washington Post). The things that make us happy

change tremendously over time. The way we feel affects how we live our day to day life, and has a

measure of success and accomplishment that we hold on too. We can all come to an agreement that our

happiness in today’s world is the media that we consume constantly throughout our day. Before then,

happiness was gained with life experiences and memories made. They have also linked happiness based

on what political party you stand with. Republicans tend to have a consistent happiness rate over

Democrats since the 1970’s (The Washington Post).

A common theme that is seen throughout my sources is that happiness and living a life that you

feel is successful all comes from what our big need is, and that is society. Our social needs as human

beings are very important and have a big role that they take on when it comes to how we perceive life and

what we think happiness is and where we get it from.

Happiness and successfulness comes from a plethora of different things in life. The two types of

happiness are hedonia and eudaimonia. There are different subforms of happiness like our emotions.

These can include, joy, excitement, gratitude, pride, optimism and contentment (Cherry). People will
experience these emotions differently based on how we react with what is constantly surrounding us.

Something that may bring someone joy may bring the exact opposite to someone else.

One of the lines in the 2006 film The Pursuit of Happyness, a line towards the end reads, “I was

gambling, during all this, that I could get back on my way to being one, which I guessed would feel like

happiness.” (Pursuit). This makes me wonder what his happiness and accomplishing life looked like to

him. This movie does a great representation of showing how people in different social classes perceive

happiness and what reaching their goals looks like to them.

In conclusion, the overall theme of many of my sources is that happiness comes from how we

view society and what it has to offer us. This is different for everyone because society is always changing

and the culture that everyone lives in is never the same. Individuals will sometimes have a culture shock

from experiencing different things and forms of happiness. It is good for us to learn that everyone is going

to be happy in different ways and see accomplishments in different ways, when it all comes to a

middleground of how we view the world.

 Works Cited

Black, Todd, et al. The Pursuit of Happyness. Sony Pictures Entertainment, 2006.

Buijs, Vera L., et al. “Social Needs and Happiness: A Life Course Perspective.” Journal of
Happiness Studies, Springer Netherlands, 10 July 2020,
link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10902-020-00287-9.

Cherry, Kendra. “How Do Psychologists Define Happiness?” Verywell Mind, 26 Oct. 2020,
www.verywellmind.com/what-is-happiness-4869755.

Holson, Laura M. “Are We Living in a Post-Happiness World?” The New York Times, 28 Sept.
2019.

Ingraham, Christopher. “Americans Are Getting More Miserable, and There's Data to Prove It.”
The Washington Post, WP Company, 22 Mar. 2019,
www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/03/22/americans-
are-getting-more-miserable-theres-data-prove-it/.