Three quick experiments on why happiness spikes, fades, and quietly returns to baseline — run them live in class.
Build your own happiness wave
Pick an event, predict how much of the feeling survives a month later, then fast-forward and see if you nailed it.
🎯 Adaptation IQ: 0 pts0 rounds played
Material
Meaningful
Setbacks
Predict how much of this feeling will still linger in 1 month.
Fully back to normalStill feels just like day one
Material (fades fast)Meaningful (small lasting lift)Setback (also fades)
What the research shows
Brickman, P., Coates, D., & Janoff-Bulman, R. (1978). Lottery winners and accident victims: Is happiness relative? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 36(8), 917–927.
Comparing major lottery winners, ordinary controls, and accident victims, this classic study found present happiness converged across all three groups more than most people expect — winners weren't dramatically happier than controls, and victims weren't as devastated long-term as predicted.
Schematic pattern based on the study's direction of effects; simplified for teaching, not exact published means.
Suh, E., Diener, E., & Fujita, F. (1996). Events and subjective well-being: Only recent events matter. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 70(5), 1091–1102.
This is why the timeline above only stretches back 180 days — this study found that life events from more than about three months ago stopped predicting people's current well-being, while personality and recent events did.
Predict vs. reality
Read the scenario. Predict how happy you'd feel at each point in time. Then reveal what research typically finds.
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Fades fast, or stays meaningful?
Tap a card to select it, then tap a bin to place it. See if your instinct matches the research.
Adapts fast
Stays meaningful
What the research shows
Van Boven, L., & Gilovich, T. (2003). To do or to have? That is the question. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 85(6), 1193–1202.
Asked to compare a material and an experiential purchase from their own lives, most people pointed to the experience as the bigger source of lasting happiness.
Carter, T. J., & Gilovich, T. (2010). The relative relativity of material and experiential purchases. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 98(1), 146–159.
Satisfaction with material purchases tended to erode over time as people compared them to other options, while satisfaction with experiences held steady or grew — matching why "stays meaningful" items in this sort tend to be things you do, not things you own.
