Reading Comprehension

PT141 · S3 · P3 · Q20 Happiness and Wealth

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Passage A Research concerning happiness and wealth reveals a paradox: at any one time richer people report higher levels of happiness than poorer people in the same society report, and yet over time advanced societies have not grown happier as they have grown richer.

Topic

The relationship between wealth, happiness, and the importance of comparison and perceived success.

Framework

Answer / Explain (with a dash of Present Debate on how to interpret rivalry in happiness studies)

Main Point

Across both passages, the authors explore why increasing wealth doesn't necessarily make societies happier over time. The key explanation is that people adjust their expectations and compare themselves to others—either due to habituation, rivalry, or a desire to feel successful. (The Most Valuable Sentence is in Passage A, P1: and in Passage B, P2: )

P1 (A): Introduction of the Wealth-Happiness Paradox

We learn that richer people in a society tend to be happier than poorer people, but as societies get wealthier, they don't necessarily get happier overall. This is because as incomes rise, so do people’s expectations (income "norms"), due to getting used to new standards (habituation) and comparing themselves to others (rivalry).

P2 (A): How Habituation Works

Raising living standards feels great at first, but soon people get used to it, so it no longer makes a difference; people's definition of "enough" money moves up as their income does. Job satisfaction is more about increases in pay than about absolute pay.

P3 (A): Overvaluing Material Goods

People fail to realize how quickly they adjust to new material possessions, so they end up overemphasizing stuff and sacrificing leisure, thinking those material gains will make them happier than they actually will.

20.

In arguing for their respective positions, the author of passage A and the author of passage B both do which one of the following?

  1. explain a phenomenon by pointing

    Not Passage A

    While Passage B definitely delves into our primordial past, but Passage A doesn't say anything about evolutionary biology.

    4% picked this

  2. endorse a claim simply because

    Too Strong for Either

    "Endorse a claim simply because it's widely believed" is a damning accusation. It would be a weird correct answer, because it sounds more like a Flaw answer choice. Both passages had some data, some studies, some research to go along with their claims. Neither was ever saying, "Most people think X, so X is true."

    2% picked this

  3. accept a claim for the

    Not Passage A

    We might say that Passage B is doing this in its first paragraph. Normally, "accept a claim for the sake of argument" would sound something like this: Suppose we were the last two people on Earth, then would you date me, Kelly? The first paragraph of Passage B doesn't use quite that structure, but it's pondering a possible storyline for the S&H study, so it feels in the neighborhood of "Suppose ... " perhaps out of our primeval past comes the urge to demonstrate superiority But Passage A doesn't seem to have anything like this.

    5% picked this

  4. attempt to resolve an apparent

    Not in Passage B

    Passage A does try to resolve a paradox: GIVEN THAT richer ppl report more happiness than poorer people, within any given society HOW CAN IT BE THAT as societies get richer, they do not get happier The author resolves it with "habituation and rivalry". Passage B, though, does not as clearly have a paradox to solve. Its author just thinks there's more than one way to interpret the S&H study, and she argues that one explanation is better supported than another. That's not resolving a paradox; it's just arguing for a preferred explanation. What's annoying is that the study's results are themselves somewhat paradoxical: given that people would make less money with option A, why is it that the majority of people prefer option A? But Passage B is taking it as a given that people want relative prosperity. They want to make more than their neighbors. Passage B is only trying to address why that's the case: "It's not because of X. It's because of Y." It's more just an Explain Curious Fact purpose, not resolving a paradox. There's a difference between solving a causal mystery and a paradox. They both have something confusing that needs to be explained, but a paradox has some countervailing idea that goes in the opposite direction. CAUSAL MYSTERY Why is Ben so sad tonight? PARADOX Given that Ben just won the lottery, why is he so sad tonight? Passage B never addresses the idea that in Option A people make less money in absolute terms (the countervailing idea that makes the study's results paradoxical). Psg B only goes after explaining why people want to make more money than their peers.

    40% picked this

  5. Correct

    assert that their positions are

    Why this is right

    Here's our best available answer. Passage B is arguing that the correct way to interpret the S&H study is to think that people prefer relative prosperity because it makes them feel like they have created value. The beginning of B's 2nd paragraph says that the alternate explanation "is not the explanation best supported by the evidence. Rather, the data show that ..." Passage A does not have anything that matches that explicitness of asserting that its position is supported by data, but it does support its position with data. Passage A's position is that "habituation and rivalry" are why societies don't seem to get happier as they get richer. It has phrases indicating supporting data such as, - "For example, if we ask people ..." - "We can also look at reported happiness over time" - "In a study conducted by S&H" - "In East Germany, for example ..."

    Skill tested: Method · how this choice captures the passage's function is the move to repeat next time.

    49% picked this

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