A few weeks ago I signed up for an experiment, Track Your Happiness. The experiment is part of some research by a Harvard student seeking his PhD and is a set of surveys conducted via iPhone. I was sent surveys three times a day for about two weeks and a “happiness report” was created from my data. In a month, I’ll repeat this process.

So, what was in my happiness report? Well, I am generally pretty happy all of the time. Most of my averages were above the halfway point. But for a complete breakdown, here are some of my charts:

First up is my Weekday chart. You can see that I’m about the same, no matter the day of the week, except for Friday. Why is Friday so low? Since the surveys only lasted two weeks, my average got dragged down by one very bad day. I’m hoping that when I start taking surveys again in another month that those results will be averaged with these and Fridays won’t look so depressing.

Now for my Location chart. Ignore my misplacement of an apostrophe please. I’m not quite sure why ‘Downtown Nashville’ and ‘At a Restaurant’ are so low. I would at least expect to be happier in a restaurant than, say, in my car, but who knows.

This chart compares if I Want To or Have To do the things I was doing right before I started taking the survey. This one is quite predictable. I’m happier when doing things I want to be doing and not as happy while doing things I have to do.

This one is pretty self-explanatory. I’m happier when I’m outside. I’m sure these results would flip-flop in the winter.
Outside?

I’m also apparently happier around other people. Though barely.
Alone?

And now for the big one. The What are you doing? chart shows what makes me happiest. Apparently it’s canoeing. Though I only did that one time in the two weeks, and I didn’t have to row, haha. ‘Playing’ referred to playing games on my iPhone. I also apparently really like to groom myself. I was worried about this chart for a while because for the first four days or so, ‘Eating’ was way ahead of everything else; however, it settled in nicely at the fifth spot. And you can see how much I hate doing that stuff I ‘have to’ do: housework and paying bills.

After my next round of surveys, I’ll post the results again and compare!