A Social Cognitive perspective on Positive Psychology

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

This article addresses positive psychology from the agentic perspective of social cognitive theory. There is a difference between pursuing happiness and achieving it through meaningful pursuits. Perceived well-being and satisfaction are derived from how one lives one's life not just from episodic good feelings or transient pleasures. Social cognitive theory addresses well-being and satisfaction in terms of commitment to a valued future and enablement to take the steps to realise it. The state of one's satisfaction and well-being is determined, in large part, relationally rather than solely by objective life conditions. Self-satisfaction and subjective well-being are rooted in temporal comparison on whether one's life is better or worse than in the past; social comparison on whether the quality of one's life compares favourably or unfavourably with the quality of life others enjoy; and aspirational comparison on how one's life status measures against the life ambition one set for oneself.