A preview of this full-text is provided by American Psychological Association.
Content available from Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
This content is subject to copyright. Terms and conditions apply.
ATTITUDES AND SOCIAL COGNITION
Hedonic Consequences of Social Comparison:
A Contrast of Happy and Unhappy People
Sonja Lyubomirsky
iversity of California, Riversi
UniversityRiversideLee Ross
Stanford University
Two studies tested the hypothesis that self-rated unhappy individuals would be more sensitive to
social comparison information than would happy ones. Study 1 showed that whereas unhappy
students' affect and self-assessments were heavily affected by a peer who solved anagrams either
faster or slower, happy students' responses were affected by the presence of a slower peer only.
These between-group differences proved to be largely independent of 2 factors associated with
happiness, i.e., self-esteem and optimism. Study 2 showed that whereas the unhappy group's re-
sponses to feedback about their own teaching performance were heavily influenced by a peer who
performed even better or even worse, happy students' responses again were moderated only by
information about inferior peer performance. Implications for our appreciation of the link between
cognitive processes and "hedonic" consequences are discussed.
Self-perceptions and self-evaluations depend not only on the
absolute nature of one's accomplishment and performance but
also on the way one measures up to relevant peers (Festinger,
1954;
Suls, 1977; Wills, 1981, 1991). Opportunities for such
social comparison are ubiquitous, as everyday social interactions
and the media inundate us with information about other people's
accomplishments, actions, and lifestyles. Furthermore, the com-
parison process itself often seems relatively automatic. Most
find it next to impossible to hear about others' successes and
failures, or good and bad fortune, without reflecting on their
own accomplishments and status. People learn early in life that
success often is a matter of relative rather than absolute perfor-
mance and, consequently, strive to learn how they stand relative
to ' 'relevant others.'' Indeed, such social comparison processes
often may be highly adaptive. As Festinger (1954) suggested,
successful social functioning requires people to evaluate the
merits of their views and abilities, and in the absence of objective
information, such evaluation necessarily depends on social
comparison.
Because festinger and his colleagues so emphasized evalua-
Sonja Lyubomirsky, Department of Psychology, University of Califor-
nia, Riverside; Lee Ross, Department of Psychology, Stanford University.
This research was supported by a National Science Foundation gradu-
ate fellowship, a National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) national
research service award, and an NIMH research grant. We are grateful
to Robert Dickert and Gilbert Lo for their invaluable assistance in con-
ducting Studies 1 and 2, respectively.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Sonja
Lyubomirsky, Department of Psychology. University of California, River-
side,
California
92521.
Electronic mail may be sent via the Internet to
sonja@citrus.ucr.edu.
tive needs and functions, the early literature on social compari-
son focused primarily on the selection of comparison sources
and the resulting "pressures to uniformity" and motivation to
improve performance. More recently, however, researchers in-
creasingly have shifted their focus from the dynamics of the
comparison process itself to the hedonic consequences of such
comparison. Much of this work has proceeded from the simple
assumption that upward comparisons generally are threatening
to well-being and self-esteem, whereas downward comparisons
are self-enhancing or reassuring. Many laboratory and field stud-
ies (e.g., Morse & Gergen, 1970; Wheeler & Miyake, 1992)
have supported this proposition, showing that greater increases
or smaller decreases in participants' subjective well-being (e.g.,
elevated mood, enhanced self-esteem) follow downward com-
parison (e.g., Hakmiller, 1966) and greater decreases or smaller
increases in subjective well-being follow upward comparison
(e.g.. Wood, Taylor, & Lichtman, 1985).
Empirical and anecdotal evidence, however, suggests that the
affective consequences of a social comparison often may depend
less on its direction than on the context and manner of its use
(e.g., Brickman & Bulman, 1977; Buunk, Collins, Taylor, Van-
Yperen, &
Dakof,
1990; Taylor & Lobel, 1989; lesser, 1988).
Thus,
cancer patients may derive solace from comparisons with
real or hypothetical peers whose symptoms or circumstances
are even more dire than their own (Wood et al., 1985), but they
may also report feeling inspired, optimistic, and hopeful from
"upward" contacts with good copers and long-term survivors
(Buunk et al., 1990; Taylor, Aspinwall, Giuliano,
Dakof,
&
Reardon, 1993). More generally, a peer's success can be a
source of either envy and self-doubt or of inspiration and motiva-
tion, and a peer's misfortune may make one feel either fortunate
to have escaped such a fate or afraid that a similar fate awaits
in the future.
Journal of Psrsonalily and Social Psychology. 1997, Vol. 73. No. 6, 1141-1157
Copyrighi 1997 by the American Psychological Association, Inc. 0O22-3S14/97/S3.00
1141
This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.
This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.
