A short while back, kyklops expressed irritation after coming across one of those studies that purports to show that people who have religious beliefs are, on average, happier than people who do not.
Now, there are any number of quibbles one can have with this claim -- methodology, definition of happiness, sampling error -- but we'll leave those aside for the moment. Maybe there's something to this hypothesis, irrespective of the flawed nature of the particular studies.
The breezy atheist just says, "Ignorance is bliss," and moves on. But it turns out there may be something else at work here: differences in the ability to deceive oneself.
Last month, RadioLab did a show called "Deception." The last segment, "Lying to Ourselves," is blurbed thus:
Can we lie to ourselves? If you are the liar, wouldn't you know the truth? In this segment, we explore the confusing and contradictory idea of self-deception. We go back to the early 70s, when psychiatrists Harold Sackeim and Ruben Gur came up with a set of embarrassing questions that they say reveal the lies we tell ourselves. Psychologist Joanna Starek tells us that swimmers who lie to themselves swim faster than those who do not. And we explore the power of self-deception to make us more successful, and happier, people.
Now, there are doubtless lots of people who truly believe in God or some other religious creed. But there are also a lot of people who … let's just say … go through the motions. They go to services, they'll self-identify as religious when asked on a survey, like that. So, in some sense, these people are kidding themselves. And we now have data indicating that those who are better at kidding themselves are happier. Those less skilled at self-deception, it follows, can't help but notice all the bad stuff all around, and hence, are sad sacks like me not as happy.
QED? Probably not. But something to think about, anyway.
The entire show is quite good, as are all episodes of RadioLab. Go listen. Bonus: also on that page: take the self-deception survey (and then see the Comments for this post).
3 comments:
The claim is, those questions are universally true; i.e., pretty much everyone, if being completely honest, should answer "Yes" to all of them. Probably this is easier to do when taking the test in your own mind, but imagine answering the questions, out loud, when asked by a stranger with a clipboard.
Interesting stuff, Brendan. I would argue, however, that some of the questions are only "universally true" when put into the form "have you ever?" I'm sure, for example, that when I was a kid I sometimes thought that my parents hated me. As an adult, however, the mere idea would never cross my mind (although I'm sure that some other people with different parents might justifiably have such thoughts).
As in most areas of human psychology (I'm a skeptic!), I think the data is somewhat contradictory. It's one thing for me to rant about the relation between "happiness" and "intelligence," for example, but quite another to consider that "intelligent" people can fall into "logic loops" (my term, for want of a better one!).
Anyway, I wouldn't want anyone to think that I'm completely dismissive of "happiness" as a concept (the mere thought of my daughter makes me happy!). I just don't think that we'd ever get anything done if everyone was "happy" all the time, and I don't think perpetual bliss is something to be sought. (This reminds me of my personal view about responsible drug use--don't forget who and what you are!)
Enough rambling...
kyklops:
... some of the questions are only "universally true" when put into the form "have you ever?"
Agreed. I should have made this point more clear. Note that the survey itself does preface the questions in this manner.
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