The social contingency of momentary subjective well-being.
Although social comparison is a known determinant of overall life satisfaction, it is not clear how it affects moment-to-moment variation in subjective emotional state. Using a novel social decision task combined with computational modelling, we show that a participant's subjective emotional state reflects not only the impact of rewards they themselves receive, but also the rewards received by a social partner. Unequal outcomes, whether advantageous or disadvantageous, reduce average momentary happiness. Furthermore, the relative impacts of advantageous and disadvantageous inequality on momentary happiness at the individual level predict a subject's generosity in a separate dictator game. These findings demonstrate a powerful social influence upon subjective emotional state, where emotional reactivity to inequality is strongly predictive of altruism in an independent task domain.
Max Planck University College London Centre for Computational Psychiatry and Ageing Research, London WC1B 5EH, UK.|Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging, University College London, London WC1N 3BG, UK.
Robb B
RB
Rutledge
Max Planck University College London Centre for Computational Psychiatry and Ageing Research, London WC1B 5EH, UK.|Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging, University College London, London WC1N 3BG, UK.|Sobell Department of Motor Neuroscience and Movement Disorders, University College London, London WC1N 3BG, UK.
Archy O
AO
de Berker
Sobell Department of Motor Neuroscience and Movement Disorders, University College London, London WC1N 3BG, UK.
Svenja
0000-0002-4460-3853
S
Espenhahn
Gatsby Computational Neuroscience Unit, University College London, London W1T 4JG, UK.
Peter
0000-0003-3476-1839
P
Dayan
Max Planck University College London Centre for Computational Psychiatry and Ageing Research, London WC1B 5EH, UK.|Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging, University College London, London WC1N 3BG, UK.
Raymond J
RJ
Dolan
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000533:Altruism; D001499:Bayes Theorem; D004644:Emotions; D005260:Female; D006167:Guilt; D006240:Happiness; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008960:Models, Psychological; D012919:Social Behavior; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D013647:Task Performance and Analysis; D055815:Young Adult