Reflections on Enjoyment

PERSPECTIVES IN BIOLOGY AND MEDICINE Volume 28 ¦ Number 4 · Summer 1985 REFLECTIONS ON ENJOYMENT MIHALY CSIKSZENTMIHALYI* In a recent account ofthe history ofnuclear warfare, the author, Peter Wyden, questions why people are still developing newer and deadlier weapons, bigger missiles, more effective bombs and delivery systems. Bypassing obvious answers, he concludes that scientists and engineers work on this arsenal of doom "because it's fun"; because the technical challenges are so satisfying to them. In the innocent days before Hiroshima, J. Robert Oppenheimer referred to the bomb as that "technically sweet problem." These days scientists know better than to be so candid, but their motivation might not have changed that much [I]. It would be rather ironic if the human race were to obliterate itself because "it was fun." Yet the possibility is not that remote: the rational irrationality that directs so much of our actions is dangerous precisely because it is pleasurable. W. B. Yeats's World War I pilot who wonders why he is giving up his life in pursuit of enemies against whom he has no grudge cannot find a better reason than: "... A lonely impulse of delight, Drove to this tumult in the clouds" [2]. Vietnam veterans who came through the war unscathed often remember the time on the front lines as the most exhilarating in their lives. The clarity of life-and-death situations where each moment, each movement is meaningful and functional is a powerful stimulant. A large proportion of peacetime crimes are not motivated by want but by the enjoyable experience the criminal derives from the act. "Ifyou can show me something to do that's as much fun as getting into a house at night, and lifting all the loot while the people stay asleep, I'll be glad to switch" says a young burglar, and the records of delinquency are filled with similar testimonials [3]. ?Professor, Department of Human Development and Education, University of Chicago, 5730 Woodlawn Avenue, Chicago, Illinois 60637.©1985 by The University of Chicago. AU rights reserved. 003 1-5982/85/2804-0446$01 .00 Perspectives in Biology andMedicine, 28, 4 ¦ Summer 1985 \ 489 It would be reassuring to condemn these as twisted, inhuman aberrations . It would be satisfying even to admit that such motives are part of our instinctual heritage, provided they are a part we are shedding and shall eventually outgrow. More disturbing is the thought that these dark impulses are closely linked with some ofthe human qualities we are most proud of: curiosity, creativity, the desire to rise to challenges, and progress . Yet after studying the experience of "fun," this is the conclusion one must reach. What goes on in the consciousness of the burglar at the height of his crime is indistinguishable from the "lonely impulse of delight " of the warrior or from the sweet satisfaction of the technician involved in the problem of delivering nuclear megadeath. It is the same experience that the artist has as he works on the canvas, or the athlete during a race. It is how mountain climbers explain why they climb, how scientists describe the process of research, or surgeons those challenging operations that feel "like taking narcotics" [4]. All of these activities provide a common expanded state of consciousness that is so enjoyable that often no other reward than continuing the experience is required to keep it going. That destroying people and saving them can feel the same way does not mean that the two actions are equivalent. Their consequences have opposite implications for the survival of mankind. But the similarity in how these activities "feel" points at an important problem. People will act in a great variety of ways, constructive or destructive, provided the action is intrinsically rewarding. Intrinsic rewards are a form of psychic energy in that they result in work: they make us concentrate our attention and persevere at tasks. Like all forms ofenergy, from fire to nuclear fission, intrinsic rewards can be used to enhance or to destroy human well-being. It is therefore vital to understand how this energy works, to avoid as much as possible misusing its power. The Anatomy ofEnjoyment How does it feel to have fun? And what are...