Six studies demonstrate that interrupting a consumption experience can make pleasant experiences more enjoyable and unpleasant experiences more irritating, even though consumers avoid breaks in pleasant experiences and choose breaks in unpleasant experiences. Across a variety of hedonic experiences (e.g., listening to noises or songs, sitting in a massage chair), the authors observe that breaks …
Tag Archives: adaptation
Lucas, R. E., Clark, A. E., Georgellis, Y., &Diener, E. (2003). Reexamining adaptation and the set point model of happiness: Reactions to changes in marital status.
According to adaptation theory, individuals react to events but quickly adapt back to baseline levels of subjective well-being. To test this idea, the authors used data from a 15-year longitudinal study of over 24,000 individuals to examine the effects of marital transitions on life satisfaction. On average, individuals reacted to events and then adapted back …
Riis, J., et al. (2005). Ignorance of Hedonic Adaptation to Hemodialysis: A Study Using Ecological Momentary Assessment.
Healthy people generally underestimate the self-reported well-being of people with disabilities and serious illnesses. The cause of this discrepancy is in dispute, and the present study provides evidence for 2 causes. First, healthy people fail to anticipate hedonic adaptation to poor health. Using an ecological momentary assessment measure of mood, the authors failed to find …
Oswald, A. J., &Powdthavee, N. (2008). Does happiness adapt? A longitudinal study of disability with implications for economists and judges.
This paper is an empirical study of partial hedonic adaptation. It provides longitudinal evidence that people who become disabled go on to exhibit considerable recovery in mental well-being. In fixed-effects equations we estimate the degree of hedonic adaptation at — depending on the severity of the disability — approximately 30% to 50%. Our calculations should …