If This Feels So Good, Why Am I So Unhappy?

Something I’m seeing a lot lately in the research I conduct is the blurring of the line between the ideas of pleasure and happiness.

I was recently leading a focus group discussion on – well, let’s just call them ‘less healthy foods’—and several participants, when talking about why they eat foods they know they shouldn’t, said something to the effect of, ‘hey, it makes me happy.’  When asked what they thought that implied, they generally indicated that they felt that anything that makes one happy can’t be bad, as happiness is seen as being itself a healthy thing.  If we were elementary school math students, we would now invoke the transitive property:

Unhealthy food = happiness

Happiness = healthy

Therefore, unhealthy food = healthy food

And that, friends, is how we rationalize self-destructive behavior.  So, what’s the problem with this logic?  The problem is that every time these people used the word ‘happiness,’ they actually should have said ‘pleasure.’  People often use these terms interchangeably in colloquial conversation, but it’s important to understand that pleasure and happiness are not the same thing.

I’m far from the first person to notice the mashing up of these two concepts.  Dr. Robert Lustig has written an entire book on this, The Hacking of the American Mind.  In it, he enumerates the differences between pleasure and happiness:

1. Pleasure is a short-term phenomenon, happiness is long-term;

2. Pleasure is physical, happiness is emotional;

3. Pleasure is derived from taking, happiness from giving;

4. Pleasure can be achieved with tangible things, happiness cannot;

5. Pleasure is experienced alone, happiness is experienced in social interactions;

6. Extremes of pleasure can lead to addiction, while there is no such thing as being addicted to happiness;

7. Pleasure is associated with the neurotransmitter dopamine, while happiness is associated with serotonin.

These last two points are particularly important, as excess dopamine can foster addiction, which, obviously, can compromise future happiness.  Furthermore, dopamine downregulates serotonin, meaning that it actually, physically reduces happiness.  As Lustig puts it, “the more pleasure we seek, the more unhappy we get.” 

So why is this important?  Because, while there’s nothing marketers and researchers can do if consumers and research participants confuse pleasure and happiness, we as professionals need to keep them straight.

Pleasure and happiness are both potential brand benefits and behavior motivators.  But pleasure is a lower order benefit – one primarily associated with physical needs, while happiness is a higher order benefit – one associated with affiliation, esteem and self-actualization.  And this has clear implications for marketers.  Pleasure may induce trial and maybe even repeat purchase, but it will never engender the sort of emotional relationship – the bond – that drives true brand connection and loyalty.  If consumers find a product that produces either a greater physiological response, or a similar one at a better price, they’re going to switch if there’s nothing else binding them to the brand.

On the other hand, brands that also provide non-functional benefits that truly drive happiness tend to be stickier.  Think of Toms, the shoe brand.  For every pair of shoes they sell to paying customers, they donate a pair to one who cannot.  To date, they have given away over 60 million pairs of shoes.  The shoes might give a consumer pleasure (my wife says they’re very comfortable), but the company’s charitable activities provide genuine happiness.  Happiness is also more likely to enable a brand to command a premium price, despite offering items that, on a purely functional basis, might not really justify that premium.  Why do you think Apple products sell for so much more than comparable competitive offerings?  I’m one of those insufferably smug Apple people myself, and I know exactly why: Apple is more than just hardware, it’s a tribe.  It provides its customers with an identity and a set of values.

This being the case, while conducting research, it is important to understand, when assessing benefits, what participants specifically mean when taking about pleasure and happiness.  Qualitative approaches are particularly effective at exploring this issue.  Because these terms tend to get used interchangeably, this requires the researcher to ask questions or conduct exercises that will allow participants to be specific.  This is not a complicated task.  For instance, if somebody uses the word happiness when describing a product usage experience, simply ask for clarification: when you say ‘happiness,’ what exactly is it that’s making you happy?  Picture sort exercises can also be also useful: please select one from this set of images that tells something about how using this product makes you feel.

Developing a clear understanding of the exact nature of the benefits provided by a brand – and whether those benefits bring mere pleasure, or if they truly ladder up to happiness – will allow marketers to build strong, lasting bonds with consumers and create effective communication and retail tactics.