研究表明:比下有餘讓人更幸福

Maybe money can't buy happiness. But it can buy status, and status can indeed make us a bit happier.

金錢或許買不到幸福，但能買到地位，而身份地位的確能讓我們更幸福一些。

An article in Time describes new research from Chris Boyce, a psychologist at the University of Warwick, and Simon Moore, a psychologist at Cardiff University. The pair sought to understand why societies that became wealthier didn't become collectively happier. After all, rising incomes and wealth made individuals happier, up to a certain point of course.

《時代》(Time)雜誌的一篇文章描述了華威大學的博伊斯和卡迪夫大學的摩爾這兩位心理學家的最新研究。二人試圖瞭解爲什麼更加富裕的社會卻沒有實現集體幸福感的增強。畢竟，收入和財富的增加當然會在一定程度上讓一個人更幸福。

So the researchers decided to dig deeper into what is called the 'reference-income hypothesis,' a fancy way of saying that wealth is relative. If an entire country gets richer at the same time, individuals wouldn't necessarily feel wealthier, since their relative positions in society hadn't changed.

因此研究人員決定深入挖掘所謂的“相對收入假定”。這是說明財富相對論的一種假想方式。如果整個國家同時變得更富裕，個人並不一定會感到更富有，因爲他們在社會中的相對地位並未發生改變。

Most people don't compare themselves with an abstract national average. Messrs. Boyce and Moore decided to try to figure out how people compare themselves with their neighbors, colleagues at work or friends from college. The higher their rank, the greater their sense of happiness and self-worth would likely be.

大多數人不會拿自己和抽象的全國平均水平進行比較。博伊斯和摩爾決定設法弄清人們如何拿自己與左鄰右舍、工作中的同事或大學時的朋友相比較。他們的排名越高，幸福感和自我價值意識也可能越強。

'For example, people might care about whether they are the second most highly paid person, or the eighth most highly paid person, in their comparison set,' write the authors.

作者寫道，例如，人們可能會在意在進行比較的所有人中，他們的薪水究竟是排在第二位，還是排在第八位。

They found that the person's rank within the comparison set was a stronger predictor of happiness than absolute wealth. 'If absolute income matters, as we increased our income, everybody should get happier at a national level, but we don't seem to,' Mr. Boyce said. 'So what we are showing is that in terms of life satisfaction, rank is a better predictor than absolute wealth.'

他們發現，人們在比較中的排名比其絕對財富更能預示他的幸福程度。博伊斯說，如果絕對收入與幸福有關，當收入增加時，全國每一個人都應該更幸福，但看來並非如此。因此我們認爲，排名比絕對財富更能預示一個人的生活滿意度。

The research may help explain why there is much consternation about wealth inequality over the past two decades even though standards of living have improved for many in the lower strata.

這一研究可能有助於解釋爲什麼在過去20年間，縱然許多社會低層人員的生活標準也得到改善，人們還是對貧富不均感到如此的恐慌。