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DOI: 10.1177/1948550613512510
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Alyssa Croft, Elizabeth W. Dunn and Jordi Quoidbach
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From Tribulations to Appreciation: Experiencing Adversity in the Past Predicts Greater Savoring in the
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Article
From Tribulations to Appreciation:
Experiencing Adversity in the Past
Predicts Greater Savoring in the Present
Alyssa Croft
1
, Elizabeth W. Dunn
1
, and Jordi Quoidbach
2
Abstract
Can experiencing adversity enhance people’s appreciation for life’s small pleasures? To examine this question, we asked nearly
15,000 adults to complete a vignette-based measure of savoring. In addition, we presented participants with a checklist of adverse
events (e.g., divorce, death of a loved one) and asked them to indicate whether they had experienced any of these events and, if so,
to specify whether they felt they had emotionally dealt with the negative event or were still struggling with it. Although people
who were currently struggling with adversity reported a diminished proclivity for savoring positive events, individuals who had
dealt with more adversity in the past reported an elevated capacity for savoring. Thus, the worst experiences in life may come
with an eventual upside, by promoting the ability to appreciate life’s small pleasures.
Keywords
adversity, savoring, emotion regulation
It’s the bad days that make the good days seem better.
*Unknown Author
The quote above, or a variant of it, is often repeated on partic-
ularly bad days. It provides some solace by implying that
experiencing hardship can provide a pathway toward enhanced
appreciation of positive events. In the current study, we tested
this idea by examining the relationship between adverse experi-
ences and people’s tendency to savor life’s simple pleasures.
Recent research shows that negative events are linked to sur-
prising benefits. In particular, Seery, Holman and Silver (2010)
found that having experienced a moderate amount of adversity
in one’s life predicted fewer posttraumatic stress symptoms,
lower global distress and lower functional impairment, as well
as increased satisfaction with life. According to their theoreti-
cal perspective, adverse experiences promote hardiness and
resilience, shaping how people handle subsequent negative
experiences (Seery, Holman & Silver, 2010). For example,
Seery and colleagues measured participants’ reactions to
immersing their hands in ice-cold water (Seery, Leo, Lupien,
Kondrak & Almonte, 2013). Individuals who had experienced
a moderate amount of adversity reported the lowest levels of
pain and negative emotion.
Going beyond examining how adversity shapes people’s
responses to negative experiences (e.g., an ice bath), we
explored whether adversity also predicts responses to positive
experiences (e.g., a warm bubble bath). Specifically, we pre-
dicted that individuals who had experienced higher levels of
adversity in the past would exhibit an enhanced proclivity to
savor positive events.
Savoring is a form of emotion regulation used to prolong and
enhance positive emotional experiences (Bryant, 1989, 2003;
Bryant, Chadwick & Kluwe, 2011). For example, one could
savor the positive experience of an evening bubble bath by look-
ing forward to it during the day and immersing oneself in the
sensory experience during the bath. In contrast, one could under-
mine the positivity of this experience by thinking about all the
chores that need to be done after the bath, or dwelling on aspects
that could be improved (e.g., wishing for scented candles). In
recent years, researchers have developed reliable self-report
measures that capture the multidimensional construct of savor-
ing (e.g., Nelis, Quoidbach, Hansenne & Mikolajczak, 2011;
Quoidbach, Berry, Hansenne, Mikolajczak, 2010).
Ironically, savoring may be undermined by positive life
circumstances. Wealthier people report diminished savoring
compared to less affluent individuals, perhaps because wealth
offers abundant access to enjoyable experiences, reducing the
drive to savor life’s small pleasures (Quoidbach, Dunn, Pet-
rides, & Mikolajczak, 2010). A recent experiment showed that
people savored a common pleasure (chocolate) less when they
were given unlimited access to it than when they were
1
University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada
2
Barcelona School of Management, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona,
Catalonia, Spain
Corresponding Author:
Alyssa Croft, University of British Columbia, 2136 West Mall, Vancouver, BC,
Canada V6T 1Z4.
Email: acroft@psych.ub.ca
Social Psychological and
Personality Science
201X, Vol XX(X) 1–6
ªThe Author(s) 2013
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DOI: 10.1177/1948550613512510
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temporarily deprived of it (Quoidbach & Dunn, 2013). More
broadly, people who have experienced hardship during their
lifetimes might be motivated to savor positive events when
they do happen.
This is not to say, however, that adversity is beneficial under
all circumstances. Even if negative life events produce benefits
over time, these events are detrimental to psychological health
in the short-term (see Tedeschi & Calhoun, 2004). In fact,
while people are in the midst of adversity, their ability to savor
positive events is likely compromised due to the presence ofneg-
ative feelings, which are strongly associated with diminished
savoring (Wood, Heimpel, & Michela, 2003). Thus, although
we predicted that having dealt with adversity in the past would
promote savoring, we also expected that struggling with current
adversity would be negatively associated with savoring.
Research on posttraumatic growth provides some support
for our prediction that emotionally overcoming a negative
event is an important prerequisite for turning adversity into
appreciation. Although there is no clear consensus as to how
the concept of posttraumatic growth should be defined or
measured (Joseph & Linley, 2006), researchers typically ask
participants to self-report whether they have changed in per-
sonally meaningful ways since experiencing a trauma. Through
this process of conscious self-reflection, many people report
that their self-worth, self-definition, and life priorities have
undergone some degree of change in the wake of a trauma (Cal-
houn & Tedeschi, 1999, 2001; Tedeschi & Calhoun, 1996,
2004). Thus, consistent with the literature on posttraumatic
growth, we propose that overcoming adversity might build a
person’s psychological resources.
Our research, however, moves beyond the broad (and some-
times ill-defined) concept of posttraumatic growth and specif-
ically examines the more focused construct of savoring. In
addition, rather than asking individuals to reflect on how much
they have changed as the result of a specific trauma, we mea-
sure how much adversity individuals are currently dealing with
and have dealt with in the past, examining the correlation
between adversity levels and savoring. We predicted that (a)
current adversity would be associated with diminished
savoring, but also that (b) past adversity would be associated
with elevated savoring.
Method
Participants
We recruited 14,986 francophone volunteers as part of a large
online survey on emotions and well-being. The opportunity to
participate in this survey was advertised during the France 2
television series ‘‘Leurs Secrets du Bonheur’’ (‘‘Their Secrets
of Happiness’’)—a French television program that aired in the
fall of 2011. A link to the online survey was placed on the pro-
gram website. Participants were given no financial compensa-
tion but were told before participating that they would receive
feedback about their levels of well-being when the study was
complete. A large majority of the sample was French, though
respondents from other francophone countries also partici-
pated; respondents varied widely in their level of education and
income (see Table 1). The mean age of the sample was 39.72
years (Age range: 15 to 90; SD ¼13.70) and 83%of partici-
pants were female. The surveys were administered in French
and all measures were completed online.
Procedure
As part of a larger study on well-being, interested participants
clicked the link on the program website. From there, they were
Table 1. Descriptive Statistics of the Sample.
Country of Residence Level of Education Monthly Income After Taxes
France 84.6% No diploma 1.6% Less than 500 euros 11.5%
Belgium 9.5% Junior high school 3.9% Between 500 and 1000 euros 12.6%
Switzerland 2.5% Technical high school 8.6% Between 1,000 and 1,500 euros 25.2%
Other (e.g., Canada; African countries) 3.4% High school 13.3% Between 1,500 and 2,000 euros 25.5%
Community college 15.8% Between 2,000 and 2,500 euros 10.7%
Bachelor’s degree 16.7% Between 2,500 and 3,000 euros 6.5%
Master’s degree 14.5% Between 3,000 and 3,500 euros 2.3%
PhD, MD, or equivalent 2.5% Between 3,500 and 4,000 euros 2.0%
Other, don’t know, missing 23.2% Between 4,000 and 4,500 euros 0.7%
Between 4,500 and 5,000 euros 0.9%
Between 5,000 and 5,500 euros 0.2%
Between 5,500 and 6,000 euros 0.5%
Between 6,000 and 6,500 euros 0.1%
Between 6,500 and 7,000 euros 0.3%
Between 7,000 and 7,500 euros 0.0%
Between 7,500 and 8,000 euros 0.2%
Between 8,000 and 8,500 euros 0.0%
Between 8,500 and 9,000 euros 0.0%
Between 9,500 and 10,000 euros 0.2%
More than 10,000 euros 0.6%
2Social Psychological and Personality Science XX(X)
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randomly assigned to complete one of several possible studies
(see Quoidbach, Gilbert, & Wilson, 2013); during this phase, a
subset of participants completed a measure of the five core
personality traits (e.g., extraversion). After this initial phase,
participants were thanked and told that they could continue tak-
ing more surveys if they wished. The measures reported in the
present study were included in this subsequent survey, which
most of the original participants elected to complete. Along
with other measures not relevant to the current study, partici-
pants reported their past and current adversity levels, followed
by a measure of their current mood and, finally, a measure of
their savoring ability. Demographic details (e.g., age, educa-
tion) were collected at the end of the survey.
Measures
Adversity. Participants were asked to report the number of neg-
ative life events they had experienced, using a measure of
cumulative lifetime adversity (Seery et al., 2010). We chose
this measure because it allowed us to assess a wide range of
adverse events, from relatively common events (e.g., divorce
of self/parent, experienced discrimination due to ethnicity,
religion or sexual orientation) to severe events (e.g., serious
illness or injury, combat experience). We adapted the scale
by allowing participants to indicate whether each event had
happened to them and, if so, to specify whether they felt they
had emotionally dealt with the negative event or were still
struggling with it. The total number of events checked off the
list formed our two predictor variables: past adversity (i.e., the
number of negative events with which people had dealt) and
current adversity (i.e., the number of negative events people
with which people were still struggling).
Savoring. Participants completed the Emotion Regulation
Profile–Revised (ERP-R), which has been shown to provide a
reliable and valid measure of savoring ability (Nelis et al.,
2011). The ERP-R presents participants with six real-life pos-
itive scenarios, such as coming across a lovely waterfall while
on a hike. For each scenario, participants select any of eight
possible reactions that most closely resemble their own typical
reaction to the scenario, selecting all reactions that apply. Half
of the possible reactions to each scenario represent amplifying
strategies (e.g., being mindful of the present moment or expres-
sing positive emotions through nonverbal behavior) and the
remaining reactions represent dampening strategies (e.g.,
suppressing positive emotions or being distracted by worries).
Participants received one point for each amplifying strategy
they selected and lost one point for each dampening strategy
they selected. We then aggregated the points from the different
scenarios into an overall savoring score, a¼.86, such that
higher scores represent a greater proclivity to reap the most
from life’s small pleasures (see Nelis, et al., 2011).
Current Mood. Participants reported their current mood accord-
ing to a single item slider scale, which ranged from 1 to 100.
Personality Traits. As part of the preliminary study described
previously (Quoidbach et al., 2013), we obtained personality
measures from a subsample of participants (n¼8,563) who
were asked to complete the Ten-Item Personality Inventory
(TIPI; Gosling, Rentfrow, & Swann, 2003). The TIPI is a brief
measure of the five dimensions that underlie human personality
(i.e., conscientiousness, agreeableness, emotional stability,
openness to experience, and extraversion; Costa & McCrae,
1992). Despite its succinctness, the TIPI has been shown to
be a reliable measure and demonstrates convergent validity
with lengthier personality measures (Ehrhart et al., 2009;
Gosling et al., 2003).
Results
Descriptives
Participants reported experiencing, on average, a total of about
6 of the 35 possible negative events, and 98%of the sample
reported experiencing at least one of the events (combining
across current and past adversity). These proportions suggest
that our sample had experienced levels of adversity similar to
nationally representative American samples (e.g., Seery
et al., 2010). Not surprisingly, participants reported signifi-
cantly more past adversity (M¼4.45) than current adversity
(M¼1.71), t(14,985) ¼76.10, p< .001, Cohen’s d¼
.89, effect size r¼.41. Finally, levels of current and past
adversity were largely independent, r¼.03, p< .001. See
Table 2 for intercorrelations among the key measures. Given
Table 2. Bivariate Correlations Between Key Measures.
123456789
1. Savoring
2. Past adversity .16
3. Current adversity .22 .03
4. Mood .43 .15 .40
5. Age .02 .25 .07 .07
6. Extraversion .33 .12 .12 .33 .04
7. Neuroticism .35 .20 .31 .54 .09 .15
8. Conscientiousness .15 .03 .12 .23 .09 .06 .20
9. Agreeableness .31 .11 .13 .36 .12 .10 .39 .22
10. Openness to experience .24 .15 .06 .19 .03 .32 .16 .07 .18
Croft et al. 3
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our large sample size, we will not interpret any significant cor-
relation coefficients below .05.
Adversity and Savoring
In order to test the hypothesis that past adversity would posi-
tively predict savoring and current adversity would negatively
predict savoring, we entered past adversity and current adver-
sity scores into a simultaneous regression analysis predicting
participants’ scores on the ERP-R measure of savoring.
1
(For
graphical representations of the relationship between savoring
and discrete levels of past and current adversity, considered
separately, see Figure 1.)
As predicted, past adversity was associated with greater
savoring, b¼.15, p< .001. In contrast, current adversity was
associated with less savoring, b¼.22, p< .001.
2
Importantly,
the effects remain robust when controlling for individual differ-
ences that could plausibly explain these results, such as mood
(b
past
¼.10, p< .001, b
current
¼.07, p< .001), age (b
past
¼
.16, p< .001, b
current
¼.21, p< .001), extraversion (b
past
¼
.12, p< .001, b
current
¼.18, p< .001), neuroticism (b
past
¼
.10, p< .001, b
current
¼.12, p< .001), conscientiousness (b
past
¼.15, p< .001, b
current
¼.20, p< .001), agreeableness (b
past
¼.13, p< .001, b
current
¼.18, p< .001), and openness to
experience (b
past
¼.12, p< .001, b
current
¼.20, p< .001).
When all these covariates were included together in the
regression, past and current adversity each continued to predict
savoring, above and beyond these other influential individual
difference measures (b
past
¼.08, p< .001, b
current
¼.05,
p< .001).
Discussion
By collecting data from almost 15,000 adults, we found evi-
dence that overcoming adversity in the past is linked to greater
savoring in the present. In contrast to this apparent silver lining,
when people are still struggling with adverse events, their abil-
ity to appreciate everyday pleasures is understandably lower.
These findings have several important implications. For
instance, if dealing with adversity in the past is associated with
enhanced savoring in the present, then this link might help to
explain the recent discovery that experiencing some adversity
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
01234567+
Savoring (raw ERP-R scores)
Number of Current Negave Events
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
01234567+
Savoring (raw ERP-R scores)
Number of Past Negave Events
n = 6562 n = 1910 n = 1285 n = 843 n = 594 n = 346 n = 722
n = 2724
n = 1021 n = 1730 n = 1614 n = 1202 n = 3202
n = 1962n = 2154n = 2101
Figure 1. Average savoring scores (raw data) at discrete levels of current and past adversity.
4Social Psychological and Personality Science XX(X)
at University of British Columbia Library on December 6, 2013spp.sagepub.comDownloaded from
is associated with higher life satisfaction (Seery, 2011; Seery
et al., 2010). The ability to savor predicts many desirable
outcomes, including promoting overall subjective well-being
(see Bryant, 1989, 2003; Bryant, Smart, & King, 2005;
Meehan, Durlak, & Bryant, 1993; Quoidbach et al., 2010;
Tugade & Fredrickson, 2007). Thus, perhaps people who have
overcome more adversity in the past are better at savoring life’s
small pleasures, which in turn could promote greater life satis-
faction. Future research using longitudinal study designs could
examine this possibility.
It is somewhat surprising to note that we found a linear
effect of past adversity on savoring, and our additional analyses
(reported in Note 1) suggest that this linear effect fails to level
off until individuals have experienced an extremely high level
of adversity, reached by very few of our participants. This find-
ing may stem in part from the fact that the adversity checklist
included a diverse array of negative events and that we only
awarded participants an additional point on this measure for
experiencing distinct negative events (e.g., divorce and a
tornado), not repeated occurrences within the same category
(e.g., two divorces). We would speculate that experiencing a
natural disaster, for example, might change people’s life stories
and enhance their appreciation of each positive moment above
and beyond the effects of having gone through a divorce. That
said, identifying a possible leveling off point whereby addi-
tional adversity fails to promote additional savoring (or even
undermines savoring) would be an interesting topic for future
research, perhaps with samples of people who are prone to
experiencing especially high levels of adversity (e.g.,
alcoholics, soldiers).
The present findings also suggest that studying savoring
could be a fruitful avenue for researchers interested in the phe-
nomenon of posttraumatic growth. We suspect that a
well-developed ability to savor pleasurable events might be a
necessary precursor to attaining positive growth after traumatic
life experiences, although future research is needed to directly
examine savoring ability as a mechanism in this context (Cal-
houn & Tedeschi, 1999, 2001; Tedeschi & Calhoun, 2004).
It would also be worthwhile to study the link between
adversity and savoring within other specific domains, such as
romantic relationships. Past research suggests that the way in
which romantic couples respond to pleasant events (e.g., a pro-
motion at work) may matter more for relationship outcomes
than how they respond to unpleasant events (e.g., a demotion;
Gable, Gonzaga & Strachman, 2006). In light of the findings
presented here, an interesting question for future research is
whether couples who have dealt with more adversity together
(e.g., a cancer diagnosis) are more likely to stay together
because they make the most of everyday positive events.
A major strength of this study is the very large sample size,
which allowed us to capture the great variability in adversity
that is likely to be reflected in the true population. Since we
observed a wide range of negative experiences on a continuum,
we can propose with greater confidence that the effects
reported here are likely to reflect the phenomenon at the
population level. Importantly, our participants reported
experiencing a similar total percentage of negative events on
the adversity checklist as in previous research with a nationally
representative sample (Seery et al., 2010). Still, we cannot rule
out the possibility that advertising our study during a TV show
dedicated to happiness might have led to underrepresenting or
overrepresenting certain types of people. In particular, it is
conceivable that a program on happiness may have attracted
a particularly resilient sample of people who were unusually
motivated to turn lemons into lemonade, accounting for our
finding that past adversity was positively associated with
savoring. Yet, consistent with prior research, individuals in this
sample who were currently experiencing adversity reported
lower levels of savoring, suggesting that our participants did
not respond positively to all forms of adversity. An alternative
explanation for our findings based on self-selection would need
to account for both the positive effect of past adversity and the
negative effect of current adversity on savoring. It is also worth
noting that the focal relationship patterns held even when
controlling for central individual differences in personality.
Thus, it seems unlikely that our findings would only hold up
among a narrow sliver of the population.
As with any research using correlational data, our findings
do not establish causality and should be interpreted with cau-
tion. It is possible that a third, unexamined variable, such as
emotional intelligence or social support, is responsible for the
observed relationships between adversity and savoring. It is
reassuring, however, that our critical effects remain intact even
after controlling for the five main dimensions of personality.
In conclusion, our correlational findings are consistent with
the possibility that the worst experiences in life may come with
an eventual upside, by promoting the ability to appreciate life’s
small pleasures. Returning to the quote from the beginning of
this article, the present research lends some credence to the
notion that bad days might make the good ones better.
Acknowledgment
We would like to thank Angela Mann for her help with data collection.
We also thank Victoria Savalei andBenjaminCheungfortheir
comments on earlier versions of this article.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to
the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, author-
ship, and/or publication of this article.
Notes
1. In light of past research showing a curvilinear effect of adversity on
satisfaction with life (Seery et al., 2010), we also tested for quad-
ratic effects in our data; however, it appears that in the current
study reporting of a linear effect is the more conservative approach.
Specifically, adding a quadratic term on the second step of our
regression analyses did not explain any meaningful additional
variance (DR
2
¼.07). Furthermore, the points at which the lines
Croft et al. 5
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begin to curve happen at very extreme numbers of negative life
events (nearly 17 events), which less than 1%of our sample actu-
ally report having experienced. In sum, there is an overall trend
suggesting that more past and less current adversity predicts more
positive outcomes, up to a very extreme point that is not repre-
sented well enough to support inference beyond it.
2. Although we expected two independent main effects, whereby past
adversity and current adversity would predict savoring in opposite
directions, we also tested an additional model that included an
interaction term. The interaction term Past Adversity Current
Adversity was not significant even with our large sample size,
b¼.004, p¼.630, and thus will not be considered further.
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Author Biographies
Alyssa Croft is a PhD candidate at the University of British Colum-
bia. Her work focuses on the broad topics of motivation, cognition,
and affect.
Elizabeth W. Dunn, PhD, is an associate professor at the University
of British Columbia. Her work focuses on happiness and
self-knowledge.
Jordi Quoidbach, PhD, is an assistant professor at Pompeu Fabra
University. His work focuses on positive emotion regulation.
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