The contribution of temperament, popularity, and physical appearance to children’s happiness

Abstract

Happiness, Children, Temperament, Popularity, Attractiveness, Appearance, Anxiety, Satisfaction,

Is Being “Smart and Well Behaved” a Recipe for Happiness in Western Australian Primary Schools?

“…Despite this the academic literature describing students' awareness of their academic capabilities and their self described happiness has had limited attention. Aspects of student emotional states such as anxiety and loneliness are connected with child happiness (Holder & Coleman, 2008;O'Rourke & Cooper, 2010) and while research indicates that students with learning difficulties often present in this manner (Margalit & Heimen, 1998;Raymond, 2008), the direct connection between the way students see themselves academically and their general wellbeing is largely unexplored. Proctor, Linley and Maltby (2009) examined 141 peer reviewed articles to present important emotional, social and behavioural constructs associated with life satisfaction in youths.…”

“…b) The faces scale was a replication of the scale used by Holder and Coleman (2008;Holder & Klassen, 2010) and comprised a seven-item Likert type scale (see Table 1) showing a range of simple faces that ranged from "very happy" to "very sad". These were used to address the question; "How happy are you most of the time"?…”

“…Parents similarly rated their child's happiness using the same faces scale and addressed the question "How happy is your child most of the time ?" In line with the approach taken in Holder and Coleman's (2008), teachers rated students who participated in the study using a similar faces scale, but completed it by answering two questions; "How happy is (student's name) when she/he is doing normal work in your classroom?" and "How happy is (student's name) when she/he is doing fun activities ?"…”

“…c) Children's questionnaire contained demographic and lifestyle questions similar to those used in adult research and recently explored in children's research on happiness (De Neve & Cooper, 1998;Holder & Coleman, 2008;Lyubomirsky & Lepper, 1999;Myers & Diener, 1995). The questionnaire sought to determine whether students were popular, confident, extroverted and optimistic; all indicators of children's happiness.…”

“…An Australian participant in this research encapsulated many of the responses when he said: "all I need is someone who I know cares for me and I am happy" (p. 419). Holder and Coleman (2008) in their exploration of happiness for primary aged children aged 9-12 years in British Columbia also found that social factors were influential. Similarly, O'Rourke and Cooper (2010) found those children with wider friendship networks tended to be happier.…”