In recent years much attention to and discussion has been devoted to happiness in American society. "How does one acquire happiness?" we often hear, and it's a good question given how central the emotion is to the American idea and experience. Indeed, ever since Thomas Jefferson scribbled “the pursuit of happiness” in the Declaration of Independence, it has become arguably the primary goal of the majority of Americans. (Surveys often report it to be the number-one answer to the query, “What do you want most in life?”).

Alongside the standard, rather vague definition of happiness–“a subjective state of well-being”–is the fact that there is no real agreement over its dominant influence. What is clear is that Americans have never been a particularly happy group, despite their perception of being so. The history of happiness in America reveals that there has been widespread dissatisfaction and discontent over the years, and that our image as a happy-go-lucky people is more mythology than reality: Our consistently lackluster rankings on the World........

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