Hedonic Adaptation: Why Don’t We Feel Satisfied and Happy?
Hedonic adaptation describes how people tend to quickly return to a relatively stable level of happiness despite positive or negative events or major changes in life. According to this theory, for example, as a person earns more money or achieves great achievements, their expectations and desires increase exponentially, so they can never achieve lasting happiness and satisfaction.
This concept was introduced by British psychologist Michael Eysenck in the late 1990s. According to Eysenck, the pursuit of happiness is like a person who has to keep running in order to stay in the same place on the treadmill. That’s why he called this concept called “Hedonic Adaptation”, “Hedonic treadmill”.
The emotional intensity of the events that initially had a very positive or negative effect on us decreases over time. For example, when we start a new activity, buy a new product, go somewhere for the first time, see or do something for the first time; it has a great effect on us and we experience intense emotion. This also applies to negative situations such as illness, disappointment, and shock. However, as these activities or situations are repeated, the intensity of emotion we experience begins to decrease. Because the current situation has become the normal of life for the person. This normalization period may be longer or shorter for some people. The amount of hedonic adaptation may vary from person to person and from event to event.
This situation manifests itself very often in economic events in life. For example, when we buy a new house or a new car, these purchases create instant happiness for us. But in a short time we begin to see them as a part of our normal life and we return to our usual happiness level again. In fact, in the future, we see better and more expensive products than the ones we have, and we believe that happiness will come when we have them. But this expectation is never met. Because people always tend to get used to it and return to the average level.
This situation is frequently encountered in education and working life. We are proud of our success when we rise up in our business, get promotions, achieve great achievements in school, or finish a project that we’ve worked on. However, as time passes, when we look back at the project we have completed or the job we have, we begin to think that “it’s not that good”. The reason for this dissatisfaction is that our expectations from ourselves rise, we see that success as an “achievable success” because we can achieve it, and we underestimate it subconsciously. As we develop, our expectations of ourselves increase, and we do not want to be content with what we have. Therefore, our relatively high level of happiness in the first moment decreases to our average level of happiness over time. We normalize what we have or achieve. In other words, even though we are running non-stop for happiness on the treadmill, we are always in the same place.
“In a classic study that illustrates this hedonic adaptation, Brickman, Coates, and Janoff-Bulman (1978) found that 18 months after winning the lottery, people were no happier than a comparison condition who did not win the lottery. To maintain boosts in well-being derived from positive events, Sheldon and colleagues contended that variety may help sustain positive feelings derived from an event. (…) The effects of positive events on positive emotions, and positive emotions on sustained well-being, however, are dependent on whether people feel like they experience variety. For example, after completing the same 10 km run, feelings of pride will be stronger (i.e., more intense) and have a longer duration (i.e., be maintained overtime) if a person feels that they experienced variety by running the race. Conversely, if that person runs a 10-km race relatively frequently and does not feel like they experienced variety from participating in yet another 10 km race, feelings of pride would not be as high, and the boost in pride would be shorter lived. Sheldon and colleagues proposed variety as a moderator within the HAP model because getting accustomed to an activity (e.g., a 10-km road race) can only occur through repeated exposure to it (e.g., running the same distance/terrain), not constantly changing activities (e.g., different routes for 5 km, half marathon, or different events such as a 10-km trail run) (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2215091917300147).”
