Is Our Definition of Happiness Changing

At this year’s Aspen Ideas Festival, we asked a group of professors, psychologists, and journalists how people’s definitions of happiness could be evolving. “I do think there’s been a rise in materialistic sorts of values,“ says Eli Finkel, a professor of psychology at Northwestern University. “Those tend to be hard to reconcile with happiness.“ Other panelists include Tim Kasser, Susan Greenfield, Paul Bloom, and Suleika Jaouad. The Big Question is a series inspired by The Atlantic’s back-page feature.