*3.3.2 Ambient stressors*

Numerous studies have highlighted that noise annoyance decreases one or more components of SWB, with a preferential deterioration of affective state [29, 30]. Based on cross-sectional data from 15,010 participants, Beutel et al. (2016) showed that negative affect (i.e., anxiety and depressive symptoms in the study) increased significantly with the overall degree of daily noise annoyance (among different annoyances, such as road traffic, aircraft, or railways). For the extreme annoyance group (i.e., participants who responded with the highest intensity on a 5-point scale), the prevalence ratios were 1.97 and 2.14 for depressive symptoms and anxiety, respectively [31].

More recently, in their meta-analysis and systematic review, Gong et al. (2022) found that noise-annoyed people had a, respectively, 55% (6 studies) and 23% (8 studies) increased risk of anxiety and depressive symptoms compared to people with low noise annoyance [32]. This detrimental effect of noise annoyance on affective state (and thus on SWB) would also be devoid of a habituation effect [33] and would also concern children [34]. Low air quality in offices would also increase negative affect, such as anger, sadness, and anxiety [35]. Conversely, some noises would improve SWB, such as natural sounds (e.g., the sound of water; [36]).

## *3.3.3 Stressful life events*

In the literature, it is well established that stressful life events have a significant influence on SWB [37–43]. Luhmann et al. (2012) conducted a large meta-analysis in which they analyzed the consequences of 8 commonly studied stressful life events (i.e., marriage, divorce, bereavement, child's birth, unemployment, reemployment,

retirement, relocation/migration), from longitudinal data of 188 publications (65,911 participants). Overall, they showed that most of these 8 life events had different effects on affective state and life satisfaction, the latter component of SWB being the most strongly and consistently influenced [44]. These effects were independent of the presumed desirability of the stressful life events, contrary to what has been proposed previously [45].

More specifically, the detailed analyses of Luhmann et al*.* showed that marriage causes only a short-term increase in life satisfaction, with no significant affective change. Divorce causes on average an increase in life satisfaction and pleasant affect in the months following the event, after an initial moderate decrease. Bereavement causes a strong initial decrease in SWB, especially for life satisfaction, followed by a rapid hedonic adaptation. Child's birth is associated with a mild initial increase in life satisfaction, which decreases in the following months. Nevertheless, this event is also associated with a minor increase in pleasant affect in subsequent years. Unemployment causes a strong initial decrease in life satisfaction, which then increases over time. Unemployment would also cause, on average (with very heterogeneous results), a decrease in pleasant affects without significant change in the following months. Reemployment would cause a weak initial and long-term increase in pleasant affects. Surprisingly, the latter event causes an initial decrease in life satisfaction, which then increases in the following months. Retirement causes an initial decrease in life satisfaction, and then an increase in both life satisfaction and pleasant affect in the following years. Finally, relocation and migrations, according to the data of only 5 studies, would cause both an initial and long-term increase in life satisfaction and pleasant affects [44].

### *3.3.4 Cataclysmic events*

A variety of cataclysmic events negatively impact SWB. With cross-selected data from 7110 urban and rural Indonesians, Rahman et al. (2022) found that climatic disasters (e.g., floods, landslides, droughts, wildfires) degrade SWB of rural residents (life satisfaction and affective state), contrary to urban residents for whom SWB remains stable. Thus, residents living in rural areas would have a SWB level particularly vulnerable to climate disasters [46]. The negative relationship between climate disasters and SWB decline has also been found in Japanese [47], American [48], German [49], Asian [50], and French individuals [51]. Compared to storms that would cause a short-term decrease in SWB, the effect of floods would persist much longer, up to 4−5 years after the event occurred [49–52].

In another context, Danzer and Danzer (2016) estimated the long-term consequences of the 1986 Chernobyl disaster on SWB, with a survey including about 24,000 Ukrainians (20 years after the disaster). They used radiation exposure as a proxy for disaster impact. Their results showed a sustained bottom-up deterioration in happiness, as Ukrainians unwillingly affected by the disaster that occurred had lower life satisfaction and higher rates of depression than Ukrainians not directly affected by the disaster [53].

### **3.4 Discussion**

The objective of this section was to provide empirical arguments from the field of psychology that support "emergent happiness" (i.e., that contribute to a bottom-up modulation of happiness). Happiness was operationalized through the concept of SWB (frequent positive affect, infrequent negative affect, and high life satisfaction [9]).

### *Enacting Happiness from Emotions and Moods DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.106954*

Recent empirical arguments were drawn from two different fields of the literature: the empirical validation of the HAP model and the investigation of environmental stressors' effects on SWB components. Studies focusing on the empirical validation of the HAP model have highlighted three emerging sources that contribute to a sustained increase in happiness despite hedonic adaptation. These sources are (1) frequent positive emotions derived from an original positive life change (i.e., a trip), (2) amount of positive events derived from the original life change, and (3) variety of positive events derived from the original life change [18, 19, 22].

Regarding environmental stressors, their effects on the components of SWB have been extensively studied in psychology. Through a non-exhaustive review of this literature, we have shown that the 4 main categories of environmental stressors, namely daily hassles, ambient stressors (especially noise annoyance), stressful life events, and cataclysmic events (especially floods), are associated with short and in some cases long term degradation of SWB, especially through the decrease in life satisfaction [28, 32, 44, 46].

However, as mentioned earlier in psychological studies, the measurement of happiness is operationalized by the self-reported measure of SWB (with scales related to life satisfaction and/or experienced affect, *e.g.*, the satisfaction with life scale, [54]). Thus, the evidence in favor of emerging happiness that has been outlined in this section is all restricted to a single macroscopic level of observation (i.e., self-reported subjective judgment). The use of a multi-level approach, *i.e.*, the aggregation of arguments from different levels of observation (from the macroscopic to the microscopic), allows for greater validity and better understanding of phenomena [8, 55]. Thus, emerging happiness is likely to develop manifestations at other levels than that which is accessible to consciousness through self-reports. For this reason, the following section focuses on the neuroscientific (*i.e.*, often more microscopic) approach to happiness.
