Assessment 1

Introduction;

Happiness is an emotional state characterized by feelings of joy, satisfaction,

contentment, and fulfillment. In psychology, it is a state of emotional well being that a
person experiences either in a narrow sense, when good things happen in a specific
moment, or more broadly, as a positive evaluation of one’s life and accomplishments
overall—that is, subjective well-being. People from around the world tend to have a
similar concept of happiness and can recognize happiness in others. As a result, the
specific emotion of happiness is often included as one of a small number of basic
emotions that cannot be broken down into more fundamental emotions and that may
combine to form other, more complex emotions. Thus, happiness is an important concept
for researchers who study emotions.

Oxford happiness scale, developed by Michael Argyle and Peter Hills of Oxford Brookes
University, and originally published in 2002 in the Journal of Personality and Individual
Differences, is one of several measures of “subjective wellbeing” (aka happiness)
constructed by scientific research psychologists. It may be helpful in charting your own
sense of happiness.

Hedonia relates to immediate sensory pleasure, happiness, and enjoyment. The hedonic
perspective concerns the pursuit of pleasant and comfortable states while the eudaimonic
perspective concerns living a good life and being fully functioning. Eudaimonia relates to
the consequences of self-growth and self-actualization.
Martin Seligman, the father of positive psychology, concludes that happiness has three
dimensions that can be cultivated: the Pleasant Life, the Good Life, and the Meaningful
Life.

In Freud's view, a balance in the dynamic interaction of the id, ego, and superego is
necessary for a healthy personality.

Maslow's hierarchy of needs is a motivational theory in psychology comprising a five-tier

model of human needs, often depicted as hierarchical levels within a pyramid. From the
bottom of the hierarchy upwards, the needs are: physiological (food and clothing), safety
(job security), love and belonging needs (friendship), esteem, and self-actualization.
Needs lower down in the hierarchy must be satisfied before individuals can attend to
needs higher up.

Materials:

● Oxford happiness questionnaire

● The scale for scoring
● Pen/ pencil

Plan:

To quantify personal happiness based on an equal effectiveness assumption using Oxford

happiness questionnaire.
Procedure:

A set of 29 statements is given to the subject and is asked to mark each on a scale of 1 to
6 where 1 strongly disagrees and 6 strongly agrees. The scores of statements which have
a (R) against it are reversed where 1 strongly agree and 6 strongly disagree.

After the scores are reversed, the average is calculated with the new scores and is
compared with the scale to find the happiness level of the subject.

1-2 not happy

2-3 somewhat unhappy
3-4 neutral
4 somewhat happy
4-5 rather happy
5-6 very happy
6 too happy

Instruction:

Below are a number of statements about happiness. Please indicate how much you agree
or disagree with each by entering a number in the blank after each statement, according to
the following scale:

1 = strongly disagree
2 = moderately disagree
3 = slightly disagree
4 = slightly agree
5 = moderately agree
6 = strongly agree

Please read the statements carefully, some of the questions are phrased positively and
others negatively. Don’t take too long over individual questions; there are no “right” or
“wrong” answers (and no trick questions). The first answer that comes into your head is
probably the right one for you. If you find some of the questions difficult, please give the
answer that is true for you in general or for most of the time

Review of literature:

The paper titled "A hierarchy of happiness? Mokken scaling analysis of the Oxford
Happiness Inventory" by Mary E. Stewart, Roger Watson, Andrea Clark, Klaus P.
Ebmeier, Ian J. Deary was published in the year 2010.

The study assesses the hierarchical properties of the items in the OHI, using Mokken
scaling. ( OR - In the study, they inquired whether items from the OHI form a hierarchy
by using Mokken scaling.)

OHI item-level data from 1024 participants were entered into the Mokken Scaling
Procedure. Participants were recruited from Edinburgh’s Universities. 400 males, 619
females, and five people who did not indicate their gender, were included in the sample.
Ages ranged from 17.1 to 50.4 years

The reduction in the OHI’s items from 29 to 12 in the Mokken scale may have utility,
making it more accessible to participants. It was concluded that the twelve items of the
29-item OHI form a reliable hierarchical scale of Happiness. Nevertheless, the scale
obtained is highly reliable and statistically significant.
Individual discussion:

Table 1. Shows the raw score,happiness score and interpretation of AJ

Name Raw Score Happiness Score Interpretation

AJ 86 2.9 Somewhat unhappy

AJ is a 19 yr old female. She is a BA theatre and psychology student of st josephs

university. AJ participated in the oxford happiness questionnaire and scored 2.9 which
gave us the conclusion that AJ is somewhat unhappy in life.

Conclusion:
The Oxford happiness questionnaire helps to measure personal happiness with a 29-item
questionnaire. It helps one to find out which parts of their life needs more work in order
to become fully happy.