Research Paper on The Effects of Positive Affect and Nature Connectedness on Life Satisfaction

Abstract

Life satisfaction can be tested through many ways and one of them is the way people react to the things around them. Several theories are explained in the essay that explain how factors in the environment affect the satisfaction that people have towards life. This discussion seeks to explain more on the effects of positive affect and nature connectedness on life satisfaction. Moreover, it is a key aim of each research to provide evidence based on theoretical review methodology and data analysis. Thus, evidence from academic scholars and researchers from the questionnaire will form the basis of our discussion. Under the data analysis section, the study will focus on a mixed reaction approach that entails both the qualitative and quantitative data analysis methods. More so, there will be a discussion on the descriptive statistics followed by the inferential statistics. Descriptive statistics will compose of mean and standard deviation. A graph will form part of data findings and represented in the form of frequencies and percentages. Inferential statistics will focus on the two-way ANOVA test and a paired sample t-test. The level of significance will be judged based on a P value of less than the standard threshold measure of 0.05 we reject the null hypothesis and accept the alternative hypothesis. Summary and conclusions will only be based on the study variable; hence, nothing that was beyond the scope of the study will be concluded. The results indicate that the two variables used gave relatively the same outcomes and this makes it difficult to determine if the induction made was effective. The association between the factors that affect the human connection with the internet are different depending on the kind of life one lives.

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Introduction

Positive affect has been found to contain a significant impact on life satisfaction in human beings. Positive affect leads to favorable life circumstances and encourages relative comfort and positive wellbeing. Several theories seek to explain the different reactions that people have when they fail to achieve their goals and when they have recorded failure. The general view is that positive affect has a direct impact on the satisfaction that people have in life. Awe and connectedness with nature are some of the factors that can increase life satisfaction. Positive affect and nature connectedness determine the level of life satisfaction. One disconnection that is observed in life is that movies show a close connection between connectedness and they also show people living in tons of happiness but research shows a different scenario, whereby happiness is only regular (Valikhani, Ahmadnia, Karimi & Mills, 2019). The low-key emotions like contentment, pride, happiness and gratitude are also portrayed in a different way as compared to what the research shows. The paper explains the methods used to collect data from the participants and the challenges the researchers experienced. It also gives an analysis of the results under discussion and the main factors that affect life satisfaction.

Positive Affect and Life Satisfaction

A substantial amount of empirical literature in the field of emotion research demonstrates the power of positive affect on life satisfaction. Empirical evidence shows that people with frequent positive affect are successful across several life domains such as intimate relationships, job performance, and health (Lyubomirsky, King, & Diener, 2005). Producing an abundant source of desirable life outcomes, positive affect engenders physical (Pressman and Cohen, 2005) and psychological well-being (Fredrickson and Losada, 2005). Specifically, positive affect lowers rates of morbidity and pain, and increases rates of longevity (Pressman and Cohen, 2005). In terms of psychological well-being, frequent positive affect facilitates creative problem solving, resilience to adversity, increased happiness, and psychological growth (Fredrickson and Losada, 2005). An important component of mental health and well-being, positive affect cultivates superior mental health. For example, positive affect evokes "confidence, optimism, and self-efficacy; likeability and positive construals of others; sociability, activity, and energy; prosocial behavior, effective coping with challenge and stress" (Lyubomirsky, King, & Diener, 2005, p. 804). Additionally, individuals with frequent positive affect experience lower levels of psychopathology, such as depression, anxiety, and substance use disorders. In short, positive affect is beneficial to a person's quality of life in numerous ways.

Although past psychological research establishes evidence that positive affect fosters favorable life circumstances, according to Diener (2000) global life satisfaction across 29 nations remains 6.88 on a scale from 1(dissatisfied with life) to 10 (satisfied with life). One explanation for the average life satisfaction score being moderate, and not high, in the relative comfort of modern society, is that subjective well-being is less about having intense positive emotional experiences and more about day to day experiences of mild or moderate positive emotion (Diener, 2000). Research evidence supports that it is the frequency of positive emotions, not the intensity of affect, that determines whether a person is highly satisfied with their life (Lyubomirsky, King, & Diener, 2005). Therefore, Lyubomirsky, King, and Diener (2005) argue that the key to increasing well-being lies in finding ways to experience mild-moderate levels of positive emotion on a regular basis.

According to the adaptation-level theory proposed by Brickman and Campbell (1971), all people are on a hedonic treadmill where their expectations parallel their accomplishments. For instance, if an individual experiences an accomplishment, their expectations rise and habituate to a new level, which diminishes their happiness. When people experience misfortune, they adapt and habituate to the level they are experiencing. Hence, people remain in hedonic neutrality, where they adapt over time and returning to their baseline level of happiness. Staying stagnant in hedonic neutrality prevents individuals from reaching higher levels of happiness and life satisfaction (Diener, 2000). Therefore, in addition to needing regular sources of everyday positive emotion to build life satisfaction, it is important that the ways of inducing positive emotion need to be as different as possible from one's everyday experience in order to stave off hedonic adaptation.

Fredrickson and Losada (2005) establish that the benefits of positive affect on life satisfaction could be explained by the broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions. The broaden-and-build model argues that emotions are evolved responses that help humans respond appropriately to different situations. While negative emotions, usually caused by a problem or threat, make an individual more likely to take a specific action to address that threat, positive emotions are adaptive in times of peace and prosperity. Unlike negative emotions, positive emotions can induce any number of responses; they broaden a person's set of potential behaviors, making them more likely to branch out, explore, or try something new. The result is that the person builds resources, such as new relationships, new knowledge, or new skills.

The theory asserts that dissimilar to negative emotions, which narrows people's mindset to the fight-or-flight response when enacting on behavioral urges, positive emotions broaden people's thought-action repertoires, encouraging them to discover and explore novel lines of thought and action. A benefit of negative emotions lies in the production of the fight-or-flight response, which allows the individual to focus in on the immediate life-threatening situation. However, the narrow-minded thought-action repertoires from negative emotions produces the tendency to withdraw into a self-protective stance in which an individual is consumed to protect their own resources. Whereas, positive emotions encourage the ability to actively work towards new goals and encourage individuals to use their coping resources when dealing with adversity (Fredrickson and Losada, 2005). Utilizing broad-minded coping as a form of psychological resilience leads to greater life satisfaction. By broadening thought-action repertoires over time, positive affect "builds enduring personal resources, like social connections, coping strategies, and environmental knowledge" (Fredrickson and Losada, 2005, p. 3). Thus, by constructing coping strategies and environmental knowledge, positive affect induces psychological growth and resilience in the face of adversity, which in turn, leads to an enhancement of people's emotional well-being.

Rudd, Vohs, and Aaker (2012) discovered knowledge that could lead to a potential way to work around hedonic adaptation. They found that individuals who are induced into a state of awe are more satisfied with their life than those who induced into a more generally happy mood state. This would suggest that awe has specific, powerful effects on life satisfaction that go beyond the impact of positive emotion in general. If awe elicits greater life satisfaction than happiness alone, once people are induced with awe, awe can provide the extra boost needed to reach higher levels of life satisfaction. The purpose of the current study is to build on Rudd, Vohs, and Aaker (2012) by exploring the impact that feeling connected with nature may have on the experience of awe.

Well-Being

Research in well-being has shown that positive affect is a leading determinant in predicting high life satisfaction. Positive affect can be defined as experiencing many positive emotions such as joy, awe, and happiness with an absence of negative affect, which consists of unpleasant emotions and moods such as sadness, fear, and distress (Singh & Duggal Jha, 2008). Life satisfaction can be defined as the global judgements and evaluations of an individual's life circumstance. Positive affect is a major component of life satisfaction. Feeling satisfied with one's life tends to correlate with positive affect, whereas feeling dissatisfied with life varies with negative emotions because people's moods and emotions reflect their reactions to various domains in their life, such as their job and family (Diener, 2000). In summation, individuals with frequent positive affect fall susceptible to experiencing positive moods.

Nature Connectedness and Life Satisfaction

Given that there are myriad benefits to high life satisfaction, and given that positive emotion is a key vehicle to achieving high life satisfaction, it would seem wise to further pursue the ways that positive emotion can most effectively be cultivated. One key, but unexp...