Back in 2008, the state of Bhutan raised headlines after it ditched the traditional Gross Domestic Product measure of a nation’s health and vitality and replaced it with the Gross National Happiness Index, which was designed to measure the happiness of citizens.

Since then there has been a considerable exploration of what it takes to make us happy.  Indeed, in 2018 Yale’s Professor Laurie Santos created a course, called “Psychology and the Good Life,” which was dedicated to the science of happiness.  The course became the most popular in the history of Yale, and so it was perhaps no surprise that when the course spun out into a MOOC on Coursera, the course, called “The Science of Well Being”, was taken by nearly 3.5 million students.

Learning to be happy

The popularity achieved by the course posed a fascinating question.  Were those who enrolled in the course improving their wellbeing as a result?

A new study set out to answer that question and understand whether the basic principles of happiness can not only be taught but acted upon by the students, with the end result being increased happiness.

The answer appears to be yes, with the people who took the online course reporting a higher level of wellbeing than fellow students who had enrolled on another Coursera-based course run by Yale on the “Introduction to Psychology”.

Despite both sets of students reporting greater wellbeing after taking the curses, the mental health benefits of those enrolled in the “Science of Wellbeing” course were significantly greater.

Practical steps

While the psychology course provides some theoretical insights into happiness, the “Science of Wellbeing” provides a number of practical steps students can engage in, such as improving sleep patterns or developing exercise routines.

“Knowledge is great but it isn’t enough. You also have to do the work,” the researchers explain.

While the authors are at pains to point out that the classes are no substitute for professional help for those who are suffering from mental health issues, they can provide some valuable pointers towards how we can lead a healthier and happier life to millions of people at no cost.

“We wanted to know if we could scale these benefits and we can,” the researchers conclude. “Even bringing a small mental health benefit to millions of people can have a huge value.”