Affect Measurement in Experience Sampling Research

Experience-sampling studies are used to study the emotional component of subjective well-being (hedonic balance). This manuscript examines conceptual and methodological issues in the measurement of hedonic balance, and it relates aspects of affective experiences (frequency, intensity, and duration) to affective dispositions (extraversion, neuroticism) and life-satisfaction. Aggregates of experiencesampling data are influenced by response styles, but the effect is negligible. Pleasant affects and unpleasant affects show high discriminant validity. Extraversion is more highly related to aspects of pleasant affects than unpleasant affects, and neuroticism is more highly related to aspects of unpleasant affects than pleasant affects. Mean levels (i.e., frequency * intensity) of affects are the aspects that best predict life-satisfaction. The specific item happiness is a better predictor of life-satisfaction than the average of all pleasant affects. The scientific study of happiness has a long history (Andrews and Withey, 1976; Beebe-Center, 1932; Diener, 1984). Over the past three decades, psychologists have made immense progress in this endeavor (Diener et al., 1999). One major contribution has been the scientific conceptualization of happiness in terms of subjective well-being (Diener, 1984). Subjective well-being has a cognitive and an affective component. The cognitive component is assessed by means of life-satisfaction judgments (e.g., “I am satisfied with my life;” Diener et al., 1985). The affective component is assessed as the hedonic balance of pleasant and unpleasant experiences. A series of studies have examined the relation between lifesatisfaction and hedonic balance (Schimmack et al., 2002; Schimmack et al., 2002; Suh et al., 1998). These studies demonstrate that hedonic balance determines life-satisfaction because people rely on the amount of pleasant and unpleasant experiences to evaluate their lives. This relationship is universal, although hedonic balance is a stronger predictor of life-satisfaction in individualistic cultures (e.g., United States) than in collectivistic cultures (e.g., Ghana). In sum, the determinants of hedonic balance are at the core of scientific investigations of happiness both because hedonic balance is an indicator of happiness and because it is a strong determinant of life-satisfaction (Kahneman et al., 1999). Journal of Happiness Studies 4: 79–106, 2003. © 2003 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.