Validation of happiness measures is inherently challenging because subjective sensations are unobserved. We introduce a … they would respond (or would have responded) to a survey question about their happiness after the same event. The …

Happiness data--survey respondents' self-reported well-being (SWB)--have become increasingly common in economics …

preferences depend on choice sets, while self-reported happiness and satisfaction are not sufficient statistics for welfare …

happiness data or assumes that felt happiness is more or less the same thing as flow utility. The approach we propose in this … paper steers a middle course between the two polar views that "happiness is irrelevant to Economics" and the view that … "happiness is a sufficient statistic for utility." …

-reported happiness. We relate our empirical findings to existing models of elation, reference dependence, and belief formation. In … motivated beliefs), we provide novel results that extend the literature in four dimensions. First, happiness responds to changes …, expectations affect happiness in a nonlinear way, consistent with Gul's model of disappointment aversion, but contrary to other …