Greater Good

For many, romantic partnerships are at the heart of our well-being in life. Yet, these same relationships can be fraught or hard to maintain. Spouses become bored with each other, grow in different directions, or are no longer sexually satisfied, and they separate or divorce. Infidelity among committed partners is also strikingly common, with somewhere between 20-25% of couples reporting at least…

Our monthly Happiness Calendar is a day-by-day guide to well-being. This month, we’re offering a special Happiness & Forgiveness Calendar—and we hope it helps you try to let go and heal. To open the clickable calendar, click on the image below. (Please note: If you are having trouble clicking on calendar links with the Chrome browser, try these tips to fix the issue or try a different brows…

Take a few minutes to reflect on someone who inspires you, and how you can embody the values you admire in them.

Our monthly Happiness Calendar for Educators is a day-by-day guide to building kinder, happier schools where everyone belongs. This month, explore the quiet strength of humility with daily tips from the Greater Good Science Center. We also invite you to join our summer community of practice, Bridging for Belonging: Exploring Empathy, Curiosity, and Intellectual Humility for the Greater Good. Th…

Parenting is an all-consuming job—one that calls for constant caretaking, problem solving, emotional labor, and financial resources. Today, many parents are juggling all of these responsibilities with less emotional support than ever before. Given these pressures, it’s no surprise that parental stress is on the rise. In 2023, nearly 50% of parents surveyed reported feeling overwhelmed most days…

Imagine someone shares a charged, vulnerable story in a meeting and the room goes quiet. In that silence, where does your mind go? You might reach for warmth and attunement, affirming what you heard and helping the speaker feel less alone. You might feel pulled to “zoom out,” offering a fresh frame or new possibility that helps the group make sense of the story. You might process internally, qui…

As an expert on the topic of interpersonal forgiveness, it is difficult for me to hear of situations when teachers and parents demand children to apologize and forgive immediately after an offense. Those are often viewed as quick behavioral fixes in situations of conflict or when one individual has been hurt by another. This process often includes instructions such as: “Say I’m sorry, accept the …

Can forgiving someone today leave you with an improved sense of well-being a year from now? A new study of residents of 22 countries says yes. The caveat, though, is that the size of the impact varies by nation, as does its nature. Researchers with the Human Flourishing Program at Harvard’s Institute for Quantitative Social Science enrolled more than 200,000 participants to complete annual surv…

Noticing the history and beauty around us can shift how we see ourselves—and our communities. An awe walk through Harlem reveals how the stories embedded in public spaces can spark connection, perspective, and a sense of what’s possible.

In a polarized world, it can be easy to demonize people with different views. We assume they will never evolve to align with us. Or we bombard them with facts and statistics in hopes of changing their minds. But a new book by journalist Lewis Raven Wallace, Radical Unlearning: The Art and Science of Creating Change From Within, argues we can’t always think our way out of our biases. Rather, lov…

“If you’ve created a conscious machine, it’s not the history of man. That’s the history of gods.” That line from 2014 movie Ex Machina keeps surfacing as I watch my students navigate a world increasingly shaped by artificial intelligence (AI). Whether or not powerful AI ever becomes conscious remains an open question. What feels inevitable is its trajectory toward a kind of intelligence we might…

In recent years, many have wondered if chatbots—computer programs designed to simulate conversation with human users—could play a role in increasing a sense of connection in people’s lives. After all, the technology behind chatbots has gotten much more sophisticated, so that they’re now able to mimic interactions helpful in building supportive relationships—like active listening, responsiveness, …

When Krista Lawlor told her teenage son to be home at a “reasonable hour,” he responded the way any self-respecting teenager with a philosophy professor for a parent might: He demanded a precise definition of “reasonable.” To him, Lawlor realized, the word was frustratingly vague, one whose meaning changed depending on perspective. That slippery, elusive quality of reasonableness is the topic of…

In this gentle practice, psychologist Kristin Neff helps us extend loving kindness inward, offering ourselves the same care and goodwill we naturally give to others.

When my newborn daughter was two days old, I told my husband to call 911. She refused to eat and seemed lethargic, even for a newborn. But then I wavered, believing it was my postpartum hormones overreacting. Instead, I kept vigil over her all night and brought her to the pediatrician the next morning. He immediately sent us to the hospital. During a nightmarish two weeks, my daughter was diagno…

Family separation has become embedded into the cultural fabric of Latinos in the United States and can manifest itself in different ways across time and space, according to many researchers. This dynamic becomes especially visible during periods of heightened immigration enforcement. Parents weigh whether it is safe to take their child to the doctor. Teenagers in a mixed-status family reconsider…

Educators around the globe are rethinking how schools shape not just what students know, but who they are becoming. In many countries, that entails a renewed focus on character education—and research suggests that the development of students’ personalities, attitudes, and behaviors is crucial to molding successful students and citizens. What is character education? The definition varies from pl…

Imagine that after work, a woman decides to take her dog to the park. Although rules mandate that pets must be leashed at this hour, she decides it will be fine to let her dog roam freely since the park is mostly empty. Before long, the dog becomes distracted by a group walking across the park and dashes toward them. Horrified, the woman worries the dog will jump on them and that they will judge…

Transcript Scroll down for the transcription of this episode. A simple experiment turning a parking space into a parklet reveals how small changes to public spaces can spark connection, belonging, and awe. Summary: What if even the smallest changes to our cities could transform how we feel and connect? In this episode of The Science of Happiness, we visit the site of San Francisco’s first parklet…

I’m one of those freaks who genuinely enjoys dating. Not because I typically get what I want (believe me, I don’t), but because I see dating as a transformative and educational process—one that has the power to lead us into greater authenticity and intimacy with ourselves and others. The realization that dating can be a valuable activity in and of itself, rather than a zero-sum game where a “bad”…