On the playing fields of life, as in aesthetics, less is often
more. Peoplewho achieve less may be happier than those nearer the top of
the heap.
Take Olympian athletes. "Those who perform better feel worse,"
reports Thomas Gilovich, Ph.D. He found that bronze medal recipients are
happier with their achievement than those who win the silver. Indeed,
second-place finishers appear especially crestfallen. And as athletics
go, says the Conell University psychologist, so go many other
situations.
The reason? We are creatures of comparison, constantly contrasting
our present position with what might have been.
Silver medalist, for example, focus to an agonizing degree on what
they failed to achieve. "Finishing second," Gilovich explains in the
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (Vol. 69, No.4), "is truly a
mixed blessing. Coming close to the gold automatically activates
frustrating images of having almost won it all." They think only about
the prize that got away.
When bronze medalist consider what might have been, they can only
imagine not finishing at all. And that gives them much to be happy about.
"After all," says Gilovich, "the third-place finisher gets something
special-a medal, a ceremony. To finish fourth is to be just one of the
field."
This asymmetry of comparisons-second-place finishers looking
"upward at the gold, third-place finishers comparing themselves
"downward" to the rest of the field-explains why bronze medalists are
often happier than silver ones.
Consider Abel Kiviat, who took home the silver in 1912 for the
1,500-meter race. He was beat out at the last minute by a Brit who came
up from behind. Seventy-seven years later, at the age of 91, Kiviat was
still focusing not on what he achieved, but what he didn't. "I wake up
sometimes and say. "What the heck happened to me? It's like a
nightmare.'
The thing about near misses is they last in our mind for a very
long time.
PHOTO (COLOR): Dwelling on what might have been: a glum silver
medalist.
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what the heck
