Not long ago, we talked about happiness, highlighting the dimensions that compose it – hedonia and eudaimonia. Later, we discussed motherhood and how important maternal care and affection are in the early life of a baby for their development and psychological health as an adult.
Happiness and motherhood - two themes intrinsically linked - after all, when we become parents, what we desire most is for our children to be very happy. And how do we work towards that?
The answer is: by first seeking our own happiness!
And this pursuit must include the eudaimonic aspect, which means developing the best version of oneself, living in accordance with one’s beliefs and values, acting with virtue, cultivating lasting well-being, and also the hedonic aspect, which means seeking pleasure and comfort, whether through physical, emotional, or even cognitive means, such as that brought by social interaction or art. This is because our children's happiness reflects our own happiness, as shown by a recent publication from the Journal of Happiness Study (1).
This publication presents the results of two studies conducted with students aimed at evaluating how they pursue happiness considering the observation of their parents' lives and the parenting style with which they were raised. Regarding parenting, two well-established aspects were evaluated: responsiveness and demandingness. Parental demandingness includes all the attitudes of parents that seek to control their children's behavior in some way, imposing limits and establishing rules. Responsiveness, on the other hand, refers to those understanding attitudes that parents have towards their children, aiming, through emotional support and bi-directionality in communication, to foster the development of autonomy and self-affirmation in young people (2).
The first study, which involved 105 Canadian students, evaluated the degree of eudaimonia and hedonia of the volunteer in relation to the parenting style adopted by their parents. Questions about happiness were applied, contemplating eudaimonia (e.g., Do you have a life ideal? Do you seek to do what you believe in?) and hedonia (e.g., Do you have fun? Do you seek to relax?) as well as an extensive questionnaire about the parents' parenting style. This study showed that individuals oriented towards eudaimonia were influenced by both demanding and responsive parents, showing that this dimension of happiness is cultivated when parents provide children with structure, discipline, and responsibility, while simultaneously satisfying their desire for autonomy. On the other hand, it was observed that demandingness and responsiveness have very little influence on hedonia. The authors believe that this dimension of happiness may be influenced by other factors, such as interactions with peers, environmental circumstances, and positive affection. Another interesting observation from this study was that those who sought the eudaimonic dimension more intensely were those whose parents were more demanding, reinforcing the idea that it is necessary to provide structure, vision, and challenges for the child if parents want them to follow a path of excellence.
In the second study, 110 American students participated, and two main questions were evaluated: 1) the volunteer's pursuit of happiness; 2) actual happiness, measured through well-being questionnaires related to the two dimensions of happiness (eudaimonia and hedonia). The study related these two questions to two other parameters: A) the influence of the parents' lifestyle; B) their conversations encouraging the children to seek happiness (verbal endorsement), both in their eudaimonic aspects (doing what they like, fighting for what they believe in) and hedonic aspects (having fun, relaxing).
It was demonstrated that there is a positive influence on the pursuit of happiness in both aspects (eudaimonia and hedonia) when parents either verbally reinforce its importance or put it into practice in their lifestyle. However, regarding happiness itself (both in terms of well-being related to hedonia and especially to eudaimonia), no positive influence was found in the case of parents who only verbally endorsed the importance of happiness without putting it into practice in their own lives.
In other words, when we talk about the importance of happiness for our children, we motivate them to seek it, but only when we put our words into practice, acting in a way that is coherent with what we believe, feeling useful and fulfilled, do we propel them to be happy!
“The word marks, but the example drags,” as it is written in the holy scriptures.
References
Huta, V. Linking Peoples’ Pursuit of Eudaimonia and Hedonia with Characteristics of their Parents: Parenting Styles, Verbally Endorsed Values, and Role Modeling. J Happiness Stud (2012) 13:47–61;
da Costa, F; Teixeira, M.; Gomes, W. Responsiveness and Demandingness: Two Scales to Evaluate Parenting Styles. Psychology: Reflection and Critique, 2000, 13(3), pp.465-473.
