Happiness and Virtue in Positive Psychology

Positive psychologists aspire to study the moral virtues, as well as positive emotions, while retaining scientific objectivity. Within this framework, Martin Seligman, a founder of positive psychology, offers an empirically‐based argument for an ancient and venerable theme: happiness can be increased by exercising the virtues. Seligman's project is promising, but it needs to pay greater attention to several methodological matters: (1) greater care in defining happiness, so as to avoid smuggling in value assumptions of the sort suggested by the title of his book, Authentic Happiness ; (2) more attention to the gap between happiness as overall satisfaction and specific gratifications (enjoyments); (3) the danger of sliding to subjectivism by equating self‐assessments of virtue with objectively‐justified values of the sort Aristotle had in mind; (4) awareness of how “positive” emotions and attitudes presuppose value assumptions.