The Changing Pursuit of Happiness

Over the last decade, we have seen a growing body of research on the history of happiness in Western cultures. ¹ Broadly speaking, these studies have focused on the analysis of the profound changes that affected the concept of happiness in the eighteenth-century Enlightenment. With the emphasis on subjective well-being, during this period happiness came to be considered a vital pursuit. This view is in clear contrast with the earlier concept of happiness as something unattainable on earth, which we inherited from our medieval ancestors. ²