What if we told you there was a five step plan to health, wealth and happiness. Sounds too good to be true? Not according to Professor Andrew Steptoe, Head of the Department of Behavioural Science and Health at University College London.
While the shelves of self help sections of bookshops worldwide heave with lengthy tomes on unlocking the secrets of success, researchers at UCL reckon they’ve whittled the magic formula down to five major factors.
They’re satisfied they’ve found serious correlations between these skills and not only material success, but success on a psychological, personal and even biological level. In fact, they’ve found that the Big Five can even have a major impact in offsetting the development of chronic illness.
So what are these magical, mystical secrets to the good life? Ray D’Arcy was the beneficiary of Andrew Steptoe’s words of wisdom on Tuesday’s programme. And we will bring them to you now.
In no particular order, our winners are emotional stability, determination, control, optimism and conscientiousness. If you can get a handle on these, research says you can expect to significantly improve the quality of your life, your relationships, your health and you may even add a zero or two to your bank balance. Worth a try? Behavioural scientists think so.
Emotional stability refers to your ability not to fly off the handle but to cope with life’s challenges with grace. In a catchphrase, keep calm and carry on.
Determination involves everything that you’d expect, "persistence, sticking to task, sticking to your purpose despite any obstacles that are in your way."
The control element of the equation may seem counter intuitive in such a line up. While we cannot expect to control all external circumstances, in this sense, its definition has more fluidity. It’s about claiming autonomy over your surroundings and cultivating the feeling that what you do and how you react to matters.
Optimism, however, you do have sway over. It seems the classic positive thinking tropes can add to and even be a predictor of success.
Conscientiousness refers to how dependable and organized you are. According to Professor Steptoe, "other people see them as being reliable individuals and so their social relationships benefit."
Neither age nor gender seems to make a dint in the findings, and it’s not clear whether those who possess all five characteristics do so as a result of experience, upbringing or genetics. It doesn’t seem to matter though, as Professor Steptoe explains:
"They’ve all got some genetic basis… a proportion of the differences between people are in your genes, but that doesn’t mean that they’re unchangeable. That’s why we don’t call them traits… we do believe that they can be modified."
Therein lies the take-home message – we are not married to our circumstances. The five traits can be cultivated by anyone, at any time, and according to this study, the sooner, the better.
For more from the Ray D’Arcy Show, click here.
Written by Niamh McManus
