Department of Psychology, University of California, CA, USA.
Emotion. 2011 Apr;11(2):391-402. doi: 10.1037/a0022575.
An 8-month-long experimental study examined the immediate and longer term effects of regularly practicing two assigned positive activities (expressing optimism and gratitude) on well-being. More important, this intervention allowed us to explore the impact of two metafactors that are likely to influence the success of any positive activity: whether one self-selects into the study knowing that it is about increasing happiness and whether one invests effort into the activity over time. Our results indicate that initial self-selection makes a difference, but only in the two positive activity conditions, not the control, and that continued effort also makes a difference, but, again, only in the treatment conditions. We conclude that happiness interventions are more than just placebos, but that they are most successful when participants know about, endorse, and commit to the intervention.
一项为期 8 个月的实验研究考察了定期练习两项指定的积极活动（表达乐观和感激）对幸福感的即时和长期影响。更重要的是，这项干预措施使我们能够探索可能影响任何积极活动成功的两个元因素的影响：一个人是否因为知道该活动是为了增加幸福感而自我选择参加研究，以及一个人是否随着时间的推移投入精力到该活动中。我们的研究结果表明，最初的自我选择会产生影响，但仅在两种积极活动条件下产生影响，而不是在对照组中产生影响，持续的努力也会产生影响，但同样仅在治疗条件下产生影响。我们的结论是，幸福干预不仅仅是安慰剂，而是当参与者了解、认可并承诺参与干预时，干预才最成功。
