Happiness Is in the Genes

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"Try and be active and social, even if with just a few people. Practice the things you find emotionally challenging, maybe even keeping a diary to help you keep a sense of reality, and allow you to reflect on which strategies work, and which do not. Then set yourself small achievable goals, and work at them. Count your blessings -- that's reflecting on what works in your life -- keep a sense of humility and work for those things you really want," he said.

One expert thinks the study contributes to the understanding of happiness, because it shows that happiness and personality share some of the same genes.

The results of this study are consistent with previous research on the genetic roots of happiness, which has shown that approximately 50 percent of the variance in individual differences in happiness is determined by genes," said Sonja Lyubomirsky, a professor of psychology at the University of California, Riverside.

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The unique contribution of this study is the finding that happiness appears to have the same genetic roots as personality -- both share genes, Lyubomirsky said. "This is intriguing, as we previously really didn't know what the genetic component of happiness really represented," she said.

More information

For more on personality, visit the American Psychological Association.

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