Giving Makes People Happier Than Recieving

Giving makes people happier than recieving, according to new research. (Virginia Artaza/Flickr)

A new study affirms a feeling some people have had before—giving benefits the giver more than the reciever.

Scientists studied human beings in four different ways, attempting to determine how happy giving makes one feel.

One method was examining people in Canada and Uganda who had recently purchased something, either buying it for themselves or someone else.

Using a procedure “designed to elicit vivid reminiscence,” the people were asked to report their happiness, using a universal measurement called the Subjective Happiness Scale.

Researchers discovered after crunching the numbers that people who had bought something for someone else reported “significantly higher happiness” than those that had bought something for themselves.

The findings by themselves are remarkable and even more so considering about 15 percent of the people in Uganda reporting the purchase made for others was in response to a negative event, such as medical supplies, and twice as many Ugandans who remembered buying something for themselves had bought a personal necessity, as opposed to the Canadians.

In another student people were randomly assigned to buy a goody bag filled with treats for either themselves (personal) or a sick child at a local children’s hospital (prosocial). Researchers assessed their happiness both before and after the purchase.

The experiment was a little more complex then it sounds at first: the 207 students sat down to fill out an online survey about happiness, then, after filling it out, they found they had been given additional money for filling it out. They were given the option of getting the $2.50 (or 20 rand) in cash, or using it as a voucher to get the goody bag (labeled a $3.00 value).

The personal group was told they could buy the goody bag—also choosing between chocolate, juice, or both—for themselves, while the prosocial group was told they could buy it for a sick child at a hospital. They were “subtly discouraged” from taking the cash because they could get the goody bag immediately while the cash was not available for two weeks.

Comparing the differences between the two groups, the researchers found that “participants randomly assigned to purchase a goody bag for a sick child reported higher positive affect” than the others.

Giving makes people happy. What else does? (Bassi Baba/Flickr)

These two experiments and two others “provide the first evidence for a possible psychological universal,” write the researchers. “Human beings around the world experience emotional rewards from using their financial resources to benefit others.”

Then again, the researchers do note spending money is only one form of generous behavior. “It is therefore possible that other kinds of helpful behaviors—such as volunteering within one’s community, caring for the ill, or performing random acts of kindness—may also promote well-being around the world,” they write. “The time is ripe for directly examining whether human beings around the world experience increased happiness after performing a wide range of deeds.”