Dr Brodie Dakin from UQ’s School of Psychology featured in Psychology Today discussing new research about finding the meaning of life.
Dr Dakin and his team explored people’s behaviour in a series of experiments that involved pain, effort, and/or resource expenditure performed to enhance the well-being of others.
The results showed that meaning-seeking was clearly associated with the will to improve the well-being of others and the more difficult or painstaking the tasks were, the more likely people were to find meaning in them.
“When we look at the most meaningful endeavors that exist cross-culturally — such as heroism, parenthood, educational and occupational achievement, cultural rituals, etc., — they almost always involve clear elements of costliness, be it pain, expenditure of energy, time, or resources, or some other kind of sacrifice,” said Dakin.
