Paul Dolan (behavioural scientist)

Education

Dolan gained his degree in economics from Swansea University in 1989. His masters and doctorate on "Issues in the valuation of health outcomes" both came from University of York in 1991 and 1997 respectively.

Career

Dolan has more than 120 peer-reviewed publications, and over 36,000 citations, which cover many topics including behavioural science, subjective wellbeing, equity in health and health valuation.

He is an author of the Mindspace report published by the UK Cabinet Office, which seeks to apply lessons from the psychological and behavioural sciences to social policy.

In 2013, Dolan appeared at the Hay Festival in Cartagena de Indias, Colombia, and discussed the role of modern technology and happiness, as well as his work on experiences of purpose, attention, and happiness. He also gave the Queen's Lecture on "Happiness by Design" at the TU Berlin in November 2013. Dolan has also spoken at a variety of national and international meetings and conferences, and made numerous media appearances, such as on the BBC1 television programme Lose Weight for Love. He was listed by The Times newspaper as one of the world's greatest minds.

Happiness By Design

On 28 August 2014, Dolan published his book Happiness by Design, with foreword by Nobel Prize-winner Daniel Kahneman. The theme of the book is using the tools of behavioural science to help promote individual happiness by reallocating attention. Dolan promoted this book in a talk at the Hay Festival on 30 May 2015. It was called "the book that will make you quit your job" in the New Statesman because of a story in the book illustrating the difference between two forms of happiness.

''Happy Ever After''

On 17 January 2019, Dolan published his book, which was heavily debated and widely covered in the press, Happy Ever After. It led to praise for being a passionate and provocative manifesto for a better society and criticism over disputed statistical analyses.

The theme of the book is using social science to interrogate popular narratives about what makes for a good life. The Times wrote that Happy Ever After contains "many surprising insights". The book draws on a variety of studies ranging over wellbeing, inequality and discrimination, and was described by Guardian writer Oliver Burkeman as "one of the most rigorous articulations of the new mood of acceptance".

The book contained provocative claims about the association between marriage and happiness, suggesting that single women are happier than married women. In promoting the book, Dolan said, “Married people are happier than other population subgroups, but only when their spouse is in the room when they’re asked how happy they are. When the spouse is not present: f***ing miserable.” Economist Gray Kimbrough pointed out that this conclusion was based on a misunderstanding of the term “spouse present” in the American Time Use Survey, which doesn't mean "spouse not in the room" but rather "spouse not living in the household". Kimbrough also argued that Dolan's claims about how happiness correlates with men's and women's happiness were not supported by the data sources cited in the book. Vox highlighted the case as an example of "books by prestigious and well-regarded researchers go[ing] to print with glaring errors, which are only discovered when an expert in the field […] gets a glance at them", noting that "books are not subject to peer review". There are data to show that married people report happier marriages when their spouse is present during the survey interview.

Dolan retracted his erroneous statement stemming from the “spouse present” misunderstanding, acknowledged it in a published response, and notified The Guardian, which published a correction. In addition to this, he informed his editor so that the book could be revised. In his response, Dolan toned down his claims significantly but maintained that "it still seems fair to say that men benefit more from marriage than women," adding that he respects that "other people can reach a different conclusion" from the evidence base. Dolan had previously said, "We do have some good longitudinal data following the same people over time, but I am going to do a massive disservice to that science and just say: if you're a man, you should probably get married; if you're a woman, don't bother."

Debate continued after Dolan's response, with a report by The Globe and Mail stating that Dolan's "most incendiary claims were based on a misreading of data." Later press focussed on the portions of the book about resilience.

Personal life

In a profile of Dolan published in The Guardian on 22 November 2014, Dolan is quoted as saying: Dolan was the first in his family to go to university and grew up on a council estate in Hackney. One of his hobbies is bodybuilding. He is a lifelong fan of West Ham United.

Awards

In 2002, Dolan won the Philip Leverhulme Prize in economics for his contribution to health economics; in particular, for his work on QALYs (quality adjusted life years).

Selected bibliography

Books

Journal articles

Papers

References

References

1. "Curriculum Vitae: Paul Dolan". University of Southern California, Dornsife: College of Letters, Arts and Sciences.
2. (7 June 2012). "Paul Dolan - profile". London School of Economics.
3. (22 Oct 2014). "Executive MSc Behavioural Science". London School of Economics.
4. (7 June 2012). "Paul Dolan - profile". London School of Economics.
5. Dolan, Paul. (2016). "Happiness by Design". Penguin.
6. Dolan, Paul. (2019). "Happy Ever After". Penguin.
7. Dolan, Paul. (2024-11-08). "Beliefism".
8. (2025-10-17). "Breaking beliefism".
9. "Paul Dolan - Podcast".
10. "Professor Paul Dolan - Swansea University".
11. "Current Publications". Paul Dolan.
12. (22 March 2013). "MINDSPACE Behavioural Economics". The Institute for Government.
13. Hay Festival. (2013-01-28). "Hay Festival Cartagena 2013: Why the secret of happiness is turning off your mobile phone". Telegraph.
14. (2009). "Accounting for the richness of daily activities". Psychol Sci.
15. (14 November 2013). "Happiness by Design". Kanal von TUBerlinTV.
16. "Talks, TV & videos". Paul Dolan.
17. "BBC One - Lose Weight for Love".
18. Heritage, Stuart. (2019-08-24). "From Gladwell and Dawkins to Mukherjee – the world's greatest minds".
19. Dolan, Paul. (2014). "Happiness by design: change what you do, not how you think". Hudson Street Press.
20. "Archive - Hay Festival - Hay Player Audio & Video".
21. McBain, Sophie. (26 September 2014). "The book that will make you quit your job".
22. Dolan, Paul. (2019). "Happy Ever After: Escaping The Myth of the Perfect Life". Allen Lane.
23. Patterson, Christina. (2019-01-13). "Review: Happy Ever After: Escaping the Myth of the Perfect Life by Paul Dolan — how to find happiness". [[The Times]].
24. (25 May 2019). "Paul Dolan". Hay Festival.
25. Burkeman, Oliver. (12 January 2019). "Want to transform your life? Stop chasing perfection".
26. Aquilino, W. S. (1993). Effects of spouse presence during the interview on survey responses concerning marriage. Public Opinion Quarterly, 57(3), 358-376.
27. Piper, Kelsey. (4 June 2019). "A new book says married women are miserable. Don't believe it.". Vox.com.
28. "How peer abuse and singlism get in the way of Happy Ever After".
29. Hardy, Karen. (2019-06-02). "Debunking the myth of happily ever after".
30. Bielski, Zosia. (July 2, 2019). "Is it better being married or single? A fresh controversy lays bare the anxieties that still persist about women's lives". The Globe and Mail.
31. Pantony, Ali. (2019-08-21). "All over the gaffes: why failing isn't so bad anymore".
32. (2014-11-22). "Happiness expert Paul Dolan: what makes me happy". The Guardian.
33. Bland, archie. (2014-09-05). "A bodybuilding professor's guide to happiness: Meet Paul Dolan, a very scientific self-help guru".
34. Dolan, Paul. (27 March 2024). "About Paul".
35. (May 2020). "Philip Leverhulme Prizes 2002". The Leverhulme Trust.