This website was actually made by SF bay area community member Amit Amin. He writes about it here and here. From talking to him, my impression is that much happiness research is pretty low-quality due to the pressure to publish results and whatnot.
BTW, you might want to fix the links—you did them markdown-style, which works for comments but not posts. And maybe cut down on the amount of whitespace in your post some. (E.g. use bullet points?)
John has the correct impression—I actually switched careers nine months ago. I now work as a programmer at a startup.
My most popular post, which brings in 20,000 to 40,000 pageviews a month, was written five months into my career (http://happierhuman.com/benefits-of-gratitude/). Everything after was less popular. Why? Because as my understanding of statistics and methodology improved, my writing possessed fewer bold and enthusiastic claims, which non-LW folk love.
I hold a medium degree of confidence in my latest posts, e.g. my one about meditation. Everything else… well I’m willing to bet $10k that gratitude, for example, can improve the well-being of a large subset of folks. But it would not surprise me if future studies showed that gratitude journals are only 50% as effective as the current batch of research claims.
If you’re looking for happiness advice, positive psychology has lots of great ideas. But most interventions are less likely to help and less effective than claimed.
Almost six months on from my original post, with some contemplating in a dark mood about when I’ve been happiest, I thought back to when I used to visit your website. I thought back to the changing of my attitude to the site based on the negative unfair comments here, I’ve reconsidered and realised that it’s really had an incredible positive impact on me. I call bullshit on all ya’ll calls of bullshit. Happier Human is amazing and Amit you’re a top bloke. I was just about to call you out on pussying out when all these intimidating rationalists called you out on stuff. But now, as I write this, I suspect you conceded to being less well research and such not because you’re work is bad, as people might infer, but because you’re humble, non-confrontational, and lowering your expectations is all part of the recipe for happiness you taught me. Once again thank you so much for your content. You almost certainly saved my life. I owe you an apology and I’m very grateful.
This website was actually made by SF bay area community member Amit Amin. He writes about it here and here. From talking to him, my impression is that much happiness research is pretty low-quality due to the pressure to publish results and whatnot.
BTW, you might want to fix the links—you did them markdown-style, which works for comments but not posts. And maybe cut down on the amount of whitespace in your post some. (E.g. use bullet points?)
John has the correct impression—I actually switched careers nine months ago. I now work as a programmer at a startup.
My most popular post, which brings in 20,000 to 40,000 pageviews a month, was written five months into my career (http://happierhuman.com/benefits-of-gratitude/). Everything after was less popular. Why? Because as my understanding of statistics and methodology improved, my writing possessed fewer bold and enthusiastic claims, which non-LW folk love.
I hold a medium degree of confidence in my latest posts, e.g. my one about meditation. Everything else… well I’m willing to bet $10k that gratitude, for example, can improve the well-being of a large subset of folks. But it would not surprise me if future studies showed that gratitude journals are only 50% as effective as the current batch of research claims.
If you’re looking for happiness advice, positive psychology has lots of great ideas. But most interventions are less likely to help and less effective than claimed.
Almost six months on from my original post, with some contemplating in a dark mood about when I’ve been happiest, I thought back to when I used to visit your website. I thought back to the changing of my attitude to the site based on the negative unfair comments here, I’ve reconsidered and realised that it’s really had an incredible positive impact on me. I call bullshit on all ya’ll calls of bullshit. Happier Human is amazing and Amit you’re a top bloke. I was just about to call you out on pussying out when all these intimidating rationalists called you out on stuff. But now, as I write this, I suspect you conceded to being less well research and such not because you’re work is bad, as people might infer, but because you’re humble, non-confrontational, and lowering your expectations is all part of the recipe for happiness you taught me. Once again thank you so much for your content. You almost certainly saved my life. I owe you an apology and I’m very grateful.