Viewing archives for Policy And Interventions

36-year-old happiness researcher shares what it means—and what it takes—to be happy: ‘Don’t just worry about yourself’

CNBC

At just 16, Michael Plant became interested in what people could do to maximize happiness, so he started studying philosophy.

Two decades later, Plant, 36, is a global happiness researcher at the Happier Lives Institute. As the founder and research director of HLI and a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Oxford’s Wellbeing Research Centre, which publishes the annual World Happiness Report, Plant knows a lot about what makes people happier.

Happiness, Plant says, is “the experience of feeling good overall. I think it’s that simple.”

Here’s what he does every day to maximize his own happiness and overall wellbeing. Plus, his biggest takeaways from the research he’s conducted about what it means to be happy — and what it takes.

How companies can improve workplace wellbeing in the Intelligent Age – and why it matters

World Economic Forum

The world of work for many people in 2025 “isn’t necessarily a positive place,” says Jan-Emmanuel De Neve.

Five years after the COVID pandemic increased the focus on mental health and wellbeing at work, “the pendulum is swinging back” to a pre-COVID era, the Oxford Professor of Economics and Behavioural Science believes, with a shift away from the human case for investing in workplace wellbeing.

Why Is Social Connection So Hard for Young Adults?

Greater Good Magazine

Social connectedness is vital to well-being, but members of Gen Z are hesitant about interacting with one another in today’s online and polarized world, says Stanford psychologist Jamil Zaki. That disconnection comes at a cost: Young adults increasingly report lower levels of happiness than middle-aged and older adults.

Zaki and Rui Pei, a postdoctoral scholar in his lab, recently coauthored a chapter on the importance of social connection to the mental health of young people in the 2025 World Happiness Report. Zaki is also the author of Hope for Cynics: The Surprising Science of Human Goodness.

Eating lunch and dinner with others brings an ‘uptick in life satisfaction’—here’s how many meals you should share each week

CNBC

In Senegal, out of 14 lunches and dinners per week, people share 11.7 meals, according to the 2025 World Happiness Report. In Sweden, people share 9.5 meals per week, in the U.S. people share 7.9 meals per week and in Japan, people share 3.7 meals per week.

And it turns out the number of meals you eat with others has an effect on your overall wellbeing. In fact, “there’s an optimal level of social eating,” says Jan-Emmanuel De Neve, editor of the report and director of the Wellbeing Research Centre at the University of Oxford.

Trump is creating a selfish, miserable world. Here’s what we can do

The Guardian

But what should you do if you don’t like the way the world is going? Is there anything you can do?

The obvious answer is to rage, doomscroll and hope for the next election. But the obvious answer is no longer an option once we realize the antidote to Trump is to build a happier, higher trust society. Drawing on my dual experience as a moral philosopher and happiness researcher, I’d like to suggest some alternative ways you can fight back.

The C-WELLBY: Towards a Universal Measure of Children’s Wellbeing for Policy Analysis

Isaac Parkes

Abstract

There is a pressing need for a universal measure of children’s wellbeing, parallel to the WELLBY, for use in cost-benefit analysis. Currently, there is no consensus on how to value the wellbeing of children, raising concerns that their welfare is being undervalued in policy decisions. In this report, we discuss the issues inherent in measuring children’s wellbeing and investigate a policy-oriented solution: the C-WELLBY. Children aged 10 and above generally demonstrate stable, valid responses to evaluative life satisfaction questions, as evidenced by analyses of both Understanding Society and the Active Lives of Children and Young People Survey. Consequently, we recommend the use of WELLBYs, valued at the usual £15,920 in 2024 prices (HMT, 2021), for cost-benefit analyses of policy affecting this age group. For children aged below 10, we recommend estimating a C-WELLBY, also valued at £15,920.

Americans’ increasing antisocial habits, explained in one chart

Vox

“The extent to which one shares meals,” says Jan-Emmanuel De Neve, a professor of economics and behavioral science at the University of Oxford and co-editor of the World Happiness Report, “is an extraordinary proxy for measuring people’s social connections and their social capital. It underpins people’s social support. It drives prosocial behaviors, and all of that, in turn, leads it to be a very strong indicator — predictor — for people’s life satisfaction.”

Why sharing meals can make people happier – what evidence from 142 countries shows

The Conversation

But how important is eating together to our happiness? This is the question that I and my co-authors answer in the World Happiness Report 2025. In our new data and analysis we looked at the link between how often people share meals and whether they feel good about their lives and experience positive emotions. We also documented that there was a massive difference between countries and regions when it came to how often people shared meals.

Come dine with me – research suggests sharing meals linked to happiness

Yahoo News

People who share meals with others have higher levels of life satisfaction than those who dine alone, according to research.

In the UK, people on average dine with others for seven of their meals each week – four dinners and three lunches, data suggested.

Researchers said the data on meal sharing had been “collected and analysed at a global scale” and remarked that their findings were surprising in the “strength of the connection of meal sharing with positive life evaluations and emotions”.

The research was carried out as part of the The World Happiness Report published by the Wellbeing Research Centre at the University of Oxford.

Volunteer days are vital to employees’ wellbeing…and your business—this CEO explains why

Fortune

And this isn’t just anecdotal evidence. According to a University of Oxford study, volunteering is the only workplace wellness offering that has a positive effect on employees’ well-being.

“My study analyzed data from about 50,000 employees from over 250 companies in the U.K. Volunteering was the only one of these interventions which showed…improved well-being,” says study author William Fleming, a sociologist and research fellow at the University of Oxford.

So if volunteering makes your employees feel good, more engaged at work and more productive—how could you say no?