All humans strive to be happy in some form. Yet, surprisingly, people are not very good at the pursuit of happiness, often falling short of their happiness goals — by a lot. Should we give up on happiness altogether?! What does modern psychology say regarding why people are bad at the pursuit of happiness … and how they could become better? Research indicates that, while pitfalls are plentiful, attaining greater happiness is possible.

Our Wonderfest speaker is Dr. Iris Mauss, Professor of Psychology at UC Berkeley. She leads Cal’s laboratory of Emotion & Emotion Regulation.