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David_Gerard comments on Be Happier - Less Wrong
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Comments (273)
I felt the urge to upvote this article on a "more please" basis, but actually tl;dr'ed past the content once I'd read the summary. Anyone else?
Yep, me too. I don't think that's a problem, though. The content is practically an annotated bibliography, which needs to be there to substantiate the summary but doesn't need to be read unless you really want to.
Still, I argue that you should read the bulk of the post. Reading just the summary may be like just reading the synopsis of a movie (if I may be so hubristic! :) instead of watching it. You 'get' the idea but you don't appreciate it as much, and it doesn't stick with you as much as if you watched it. Less mental associations.
And to be more specific, you will miss, among other things, the supporting argument (aside from the obvious) for why you should make a point of avoiding bad experiences. Perhaps I should have included it in the summary.
Evidently almost everybody, since nobody has pointed out the broken link here:
"This research also supports the broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions by demonstrating that higher levels of happiness may expand an individual’s mindset to include thoughts of others."
Which is a pity, because I thought the meat of the post added a lot to the (already completely awesome!) summary.
(Also: there's a broken link.)
ETA: Also, I see a lot of references to "(Aaker et al 2010)" throughout the post- is that the same as "(Aaker, Rudd, & Mogilner, 2010)," which is only cited once?
Fixed and fixed! How do you have such sharp eyes.
Yes, and I don't learn well from outline-summaries only. I imagine that I would not gain much if I had read only the summary up top. The just-acquired lessons would quickly dissipate without the examples and explanations to reinforce them.
Thanks- I'm just following whatever extracts I find particularly interesting back to the original papers. (I found the bit about spare time leading to happiness particularly interesting, which is how I found the Aaker reference.)
One more thing: In the sentence "Aside from making them happier, you will also improve your relationship with them via the Benjamin Franklin effect, which — unintuitively — makes people like you more if you ask them for favors.", the link to the wikipedia article on the Ben Franklin Effect links to this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Franklin_Effect
Instead of to the article here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Franklin_effect
Fixed.
Does this mean that outline-summaries in posts like this are a bad idea, given that people can be very impatient?
(BTW, before tl;dr-ing, try breathing deeply first. It may make you feel less impatient :p )
No. I read the outline summary. I wouldn't have read just a wall of text. I may have scrolled through and read the section headings - but that gives me essentially the outline summary.
No no, outline summaries are a great idea! Just keep in mind that may be all someone reads ;-)
I found some of the content in the summary sufficiently noteworthy that I will remember it, regardless of the supporting evidence, and for the rest, the supporting evidence doesn't help. In particular, asking people for favours to give them the opportunity to be kind is a cool idea that is new to me, which I intend to start doing.
I read about half of the article and skimmed the rest.
Me too.