Social Interactions and Well-Being

Which Kinds of Social Experiences Matter for Well-Being?

Social relationships are often said to be among the most important causes of well-being. Past research clearly shows that people tend to feel happier when they are socializing than when they are alone. What is less clear is which kinds of social interactions matter for well-being, and for whom.

Extraverts tend to be better off across most dimensions of well-being (Sun, Kaufman, & Smillie, 2018, J. of Personality). Intriguingly, however, even introverts feel happier and more authentic when they act more extraverted in the moment (Sun et al., 2017, Emotion; Wilt, Sun, Jacques-Hamilton, & Smillie, under review). Could people become happier if they intentionally act more extraverted? Providing the first published evidence of the viability of an extraverted behavior well-being intervention, my collaborators and I found that most people feel happier when they act “in a bold, talkative, outgoing, active, and assertive way” for one week (Jacques-Hamilton, Sun, & Smillie, 2019, JEP:G). However, we also found that extreme introverts experience fewer benefits—and even some costs (e.g., feeling tired and inauthentic)—of acting extraverted for an entire week.

Which social experiences are more beneficial for introverts? Popular portrayals suggest that “introverts have a horror of small talk, but enjoy deep discussions” (Cain, 2012, p. 11). To test this idea, I combined data from the Electronically Activated Recorder (EAR), an unobtrusive audio recording device that recorded 30-second audio snippets of peoples’ real-world behavior every 9.5 minutes, with experience sampling method (ESM) reports of their momentary well-being several times per day. I found that people experience greater well-being when observers think that the person is having deeper and more self-disclosing conversations than usual (based on EAR recordings; Sun, Harris, & Vazire, 2020, JPSP). In addition, deeper-than-usual conversations were even more strongly associated with feelings of social connectedness for introverts than for extraverts.

Thus, my findings suggest that people could improve their well-being by bringing greater energy and depth to their everyday social interactions; however, personality traits may shape which social experiences are particularly beneficial. Thus, well-being interventions should be tailored to the individual’s personality.

How Do People Regulate Their Social Experiences?

Current and future directions. My current focus is on better understanding the dynamics and regulation of social connectedness. I theorize that some people have a more proactive style, such that they initiate most of their social interactions, whereas others have a more passive style, such that they tend to wait for other people to initiate interactions with them. Self- vs. other-initiation is a fundamental dimension of social experience that could have broad implications for a person’s social life. I propose that self- and other-initiated interactions each offer distinct well-being benefits, and that some optimal balance of self- and other-initiated interactions is likely necessary to maximize a person’s sense of connectedness. I am currently designing experience sampling and round-robin studies to test these ideas.

Such individual differences in social preferences may stem in part from a desire to balance the need for connection with other valued goals. Supporting this idea, my collaborators and I recently found that people feel more connected but also less autonomous (i.e., free to do whatever they want) when they are interacting (vs. not interacting) with others (Hoan, MacDonald, & Sun, R&R). People with an avoidant attachment style (i.e., who have a strong desire for independence, are uncomfortable with intimacy, and tend to distrust others) feel a particularly sharp decrease in autonomy during social interactions, which might explain their difficulties with forming and maintaining emotionally close connections. These findings provide the first direct demonstration of a tradeoff between two fundamental needs—connectedness and autonomy—in the context of everyday social interactions; a tradeoff that avoidantly attached people feel especially keenly.