Ambition hurts

Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs were right: don't get above your raisin' is good advice, according to this new paper.
The reason for this is simple. If you have high aspirations, the chances are that you'll have to revise them down as you realize that you'll never get the big money job and beautiful wife. And this can hurt.
Though this seems trivial, what's cunning  about the paper is that they actually provide some evidence for it. In low stakes lotteries in laboratory experiments, the researchers found that subjects who began with high expectations ended up unhappier.
This has a bearing upon the growing happiness research literature.  This says that we compare ourselves to reference groups - those close to us, which is why Ashley Cole regarded a £55,000 a week pay offer as an insult, and why Africans aren't very much less happy than Europeans. But this isn't the whole truth. Our reference frame also depends upon our initial expectations. And if you aspire to nowt, you'll not be disappointed.
This suggests that there might be a conflict between egalitarianism and utilitarianism. We might be able to increase aggregate happiness by taking money from those with low aspirations and giving it to those with high, but thwarted, aspirations. But would this be just?

Comments

[Tim Worstall]

Also explains the Danish conundrum: they're a lot happier than most and also have the lowest expectations.

[jameshigham]

...you'll never get the big money job and beautiful wife...

Unless, of course, managerialism is abolished and workers get their slice of the pie.

[Matt Munro]

The frame of reference also includes social representations (generated by advertsising & media) which induce aspiration and group membership through consumption. Unhappiness then arises through self comparison with a reference group that has no basis in reality, or is simply unrepresentative of society.
The best approach is to set yourself very low standards, and then fail to meet them, that way you can't dissapoint anyone.

[dearieme]

Aspirations? It's true that I vaguely assumed that I'd end up in charge of the Queen's Navee, so that discovering at 18 that I needed glasses was a bit of a shock. A four-eyes barking "Damn the torpedoes"? I think not. But I'm not sure that "aspiration" quite covers a vague assumption, does it? And, you'll be glad to know, my dismal guitar-plucking proved no barrier to finding myself with a beautiful wife. Don't give up, kid.

[Tom]

I'm a very contented person. Does this mean I have an ugly wife? Shall I give her your address and a tyre iron?

Speaking personally, I've always assumed this is why I don't like risk taking (including gambling, drugs and such things). I became aware fairly early on that the joy of winning was, for me, less than the pain of losing, both in depth and length.

There must, presumably, be people who are the other way round, for whom the joy of winning eclipses the pain of losing. Is the conclusion from this that they'll actually be less happy overall?

[Bruce]

If you want to get all Country & Western about it, having a beautful wife (who other men covet) is no guarantee of happiness. (I realise I'm missing the point.)

[william]

So high aspirations lead to unhappiness? Big deal; happiness isn't everything. If you're realistic, you'll realize that aiming high and failing is still better than aiming low and succeeding.

[Zorro]

If that comment is true, Ashley Cole should be waterboarded until he begs to be actually drowned to death.