Abstract

DURON-RAMOS, Maria Fernanda; GARCIA VAZQUEZ, Fernanda Inéz; COLLINS TENORIO, Jeny Judith  and  MARQUEZ PEREZ, Paula Jetsabel. Orientations to Happiness: Pleasure, Meaning, and Engagement. Socio-Demographic Differences. Psicumex [online]. 2022, vol.12, e487.  Epub Jan 13, 2023. ISSN 2007-5936.  https://doi.org/10.36793/psicumex.v12i1.487.

Positive psychology is interested in investigating the positive aspects of the human being, such as happiness, and the factors that might help promote it. Recent studies suggest that happiness orientations are valuable for research in this field. There are three orientations to happiness: pleasure, meaning, and engagement, which provide an extensive understanding of happiness. This study aimed to establish the difference in orientations to happiness according to age, socioeconomic level, education status, and gender in the Mexican population. The research is quantitative, non-experimental, cross-sectional, and descriptive. The participants were 200 people from a city northwest of Mexico. Statistical analysis (ANOVA and t student) was performed to compare groups by age, socioeconomic level, and education status; t-test was used to compare gender. Differences in orientations to happiness were only significant according to age. People from 26 to 36 years old reported lower happiness than the younger (18-26) and older people (37-80). Finally, the possible implications of these results are discussed.

Keywords : happiness; age; socio-economic level; education status; gender.