Where Will Research Go in the Coming Century? Andrew Oswald IZA and Warwick

1. Where Will Research Go in the Coming Century? Andrew Oswald IZA and Warwick

2. Our future?

3. The dividing lines between health economists, well-being researchers, psychiatry researchers, biological scientists, etc, will become increasingly blurry.

4. Today I’d like to suggest a number of ideas.

5. Some perhaps unusual

6. Self-reported health and number of daily portions of fruit and veg

7. We find an equivalent relationship between mental well-being and the consumption of fruit and vegetables – peaking above the 5-a-day level.

8. Now to one of the great mysteries:

9. The pattern of a typical person’s happiness through life

10. Arthur Stone, Angus Deaton, et al (2010)

11. Overall well-being

12. The next slide is unusual.

13. Happiness plotted against age

14. Happiness plotted against age

15. Over the next few decades, it is likely that researchers will try intensively to understand the U shape in human happiness.

16. One way to think is as Happiness = f(age) = a(age) + b(age) +c(age)....

17. Stone et al in PNAS

18. Work by Bert Van Landeghem on cohorts

19. The probability of depression by age Males, LFS data set 2004-2006 0.02 0.015 0.01 Regression coefficient 0.005 0 -0.005 -0.01 1938 1942 1946 1950 1954 1958 1962 1966 1970 1974 1978 1982 1986 1990 Year of birth

20. Depression by age among females: LFS data 2004-2006Q2 0.002 0 -0.002 -0.004 Regression coefficient -0.006 -0.008 -0.01 -0.012 -0.014 1942 1946 1950 1954 1958 1962 1966 1970 1974 1978 1982 1986 1990 Year of birth

21. The Relationship Between the Probability of Antidepressant Use and Age (European nations)

22. Biomarkers will be researcherd

23. Could physiological measures, like heart rate and blood pressure, be used as proxies for well-being?

24. Yes, but along the way we will have to accept some strange ideas.

25. It is widely believed that high blood pressure is a sign of high mental strain.

26. It is widely believed that high blood pressure is a sign of high mental strain.

27. “The pathological (abnormal) consequences of mental stress are...chronic anxiety states, high blood pressure, heart disease, and addictive disorders...” Medicine.net

28. Well, in a population, that seems completely wrong.

29. Well, in a population, that seems completely wrong. There is an inverse relationship.

30. People with higher blood pressure are actually less stressed (on a GHQ mental disorders measure).

31. Here is a plot from our British data that conveys the flavour:

32. GHQ Mental Strain and Systolic B.P.

33. Typical GHQ mental-strain questions

34. Typical GHQ mental-strain questions Aggregating across: Lost much sleep over worry? Felt constantly under strain? Felt you could not overcome your difficulties? Been feeling unhappy and depressed? Been losing confidence in yourself? Been thinking of yourself as a worthless person? Been able to enjoy your normal day-to-day activities?

35. Mental well-being increases up to approximately 8-a-day.

36. In heart biomarker equations, once fruit and vegetable consumption is held constant, there is an income gradient only in heart rate and C-reactive protein.

37. Next, consider the Stiglitz Commission’s Findings

38. Stiglitz Report 2009: “Measures of .. objective and subjective well-being provide key information about people’s quality of life. Statistical offices [worldwide] should incorporate questions to capture people’s life evaluations, hedonic experiences … in their own survey.” P.16. Executive Summary of Commission Report.

39. “Emphasis on growth is misguided” “Beyond GDP” “Measuring what matters”

40. The Report’s Arguments

41. The Report’s Arguments • Life is now more complex The time has come to adapt our system of measurement … to better reflect the structural changes which have characterized the evolution of modern economies.

42. Services dominate In effect, the growing share of services and the production of increasingly complex products make the measurement of output and economic performance more difficult than in the past.

43. In the UK

44. In the UK In 1900, there were 1 million coal miners (5% of the workforce).

45. In the UK In 1900, there were 1 million coal miners (5% of the workforce). Today there are approximately 1,000.

46. We need to measure well-being per se A… unifying theme of the report, is that the time is ripe for our measurement system to shift emphasis from measuring economic production to measuring people’s well-being.

47. Inequality itself matters Recommendation 7: Quality-of-life indicators in all the dimensions covered should assess inequalities in a comprehensive way.

48. Official statistics should blend objective and subjective well-being data Recommendation 10: Measures of both objective and subjective well-being provide key information about people’s quality of life. Statistical offices should incorporate questions to capture people’s life evaluations, hedonic experiences and priorities in their own survey.

49. Sustainability must be a criterion Recommendation 11: Sustainability assessment requires a well-identified dashboard of indicators…the components of this dashboard should be … interpretable as variations of some underlying “stocks”. A monetary index of sustainability has its place in such a dashboard

50. Those early points from Lecture 1 again: