The Huffington Post posted an online news outlet survey by The Daily Beast that rated the “happiest colleges”. Texas A&M scored the highest possible score (10 being the highest ranking possible) for “Overall Student Experience”, 9.8 in the “Would You Do It Again” category and 9.2 for “Full-time Freshman Student Retention”. Texas A&M’s vice president for student affairs, Lt. Gen. Joe Weber (USMC-Ret,) offered the following observation in response to the survey: “Why is everyone so happy in Aggieland? I’d like to think that it’s because from the very beginning we all work to instill in our students the traditions and camaraderie—the Aggie Spirit—that have served us so well throughout our proud history. It all starts with the likes of Fish Camp
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With the growing body of research within the positive psychology field, there have been multiple paths to greater personal happiness identified. Stanford Graduate School of Business professor Jennifer Aaker, suggests that engaging in a rewarding activity- particularly one that involves doing something nice for someone else creates a pleasurable ‘helper’s high’ which benefits the giver. Aaker and her colleagues additionally found that givers with a more specific, concrete agenda (e.g., trying to make someone smile) experience greater happiness than those perusing a more abstract goal (e.g., trying to make someone happy). Their research further suggests that when we experience a bigger helper’s high, we not only feel greater happiness in the moment, but we may also be more likely to give again, in the future. For Aaker, the relationship between acts of kindness and happiness is strongly linked. These acts of kindness can be large or small, ranging anywhere from a smile to a stranger to sitting down to comfort someone who is having a rough day. Many colleges and universities offer volunteer and outreach opportunities that serve as a wonderful opportunity for students to participate and help out in their community. However, recent statistics indicate that the national average of college students, who volunteer, is 26 percent (SOURCE). This means that a majority of college students will …show more content…
The research findings additionally suggest that an individual’s view of happiness depended far more upon their sense of time, than their age. Additionally, they believe that attitudes toward happiness are highly malleable and easily influenced by shifting the timeframe people consider. To maximize these findings in regards to college students, it is important when college faculty provide an on-campus intervention, for students, to provide contextual cues that encourage students to savor the present moment. Further more, it is equally important for such interventions to prepare students to experience happiness. This intervention method provides further resilience to college students dropping out due to fear of future tuition debt or feeling overwhelmed in their current
With the growing body of research within the positive psychology field, there have been multiple paths to greater personal happiness identified. Stanford Graduate School of Business professor Jennifer Aaker, suggests that engaging in a rewarding activity- particularly one that involves doing something nice for someone else creates a pleasurable ‘helper’s high’ which benefits the giver. Aaker and her colleagues additionally found that givers with a more specific, concrete agenda (e.g., trying to make someone smile) experience greater happiness than those perusing a more abstract goal (e.g., trying to make someone happy). Their research further suggests that when we experience a bigger helper’s high, we not only feel greater happiness in the moment, but we may also be more likely to give again, in the future. For Aaker, the relationship between acts of kindness and happiness is strongly linked. These acts of kindness can be large or small, ranging anywhere from a smile to a stranger to sitting down to comfort someone who is having a rough day. Many colleges and universities offer volunteer and outreach opportunities that serve as a wonderful opportunity for students to participate and help out in their community. However, recent statistics indicate that the national average of college students, who volunteer, is 26 percent (SOURCE). This means that a majority of college students will …show more content…
The research findings additionally suggest that an individual’s view of happiness depended far more upon their sense of time, than their age. Additionally, they believe that attitudes toward happiness are highly malleable and easily influenced by shifting the timeframe people consider. To maximize these findings in regards to college students, it is important when college faculty provide an on-campus intervention, for students, to provide contextual cues that encourage students to savor the present moment. Further more, it is equally important for such interventions to prepare students to experience happiness. This intervention method provides further resilience to college students dropping out due to fear of future tuition debt or feeling overwhelmed in their current