Did you ever try to forget stress at home by immersing yourself in work? For a short time this strategy may work, but over the long run becoming a workaholic will not compensate for unhappiness in private life according a new study from Kingston University’s Business School.

British researchers studied the job and life satisfaction of more than 10, 000 people across thirty European countries. They found that job satisfaction and life satisfaction are correlated, meaning if you are happy in your private life you are also more likely to be happy at your workplace; and those, who are unhappy at home, are also more likely to be unhappy at work. The researchers found no evidence that someone, who is unhappy at home will feel compensated by work in any way.

One explanation for this finding could be that happiness has also a genetic aspect according to psychological studies. Inherited personality traits such as negative affect (tendency to have emotions like anger, fear or hostility), self-esteem, extraversion, emotional stability, self-efficacy (perceived ability to master the environment), and locus of control (perceived amount of control about one’s life) impact overall happiness. Someone, who feels in control over his/her life, has self-esteem, is emotionally stable, and feels competent are genetically predisposed to be happy with their  jobs and life in general.

Author: Christiane Turnheim. Christiane is Life & Career Coach at Coach4U.net. She teaches psychology at a Boston-area Community College and published the workbook “Learn to love your Job”. She can be reached at ten.u4hcaocnull@enaitsirhc ; www.coach4u.net

How to be happy at work? The answer: Be happy in your life.

According to a new study published by the British Psychological Society people, who feel generally happy in their lifes are more likely to like their jobs. On the flip side, those who are unhappy in life are unlikely to be experiencing  job satisfaction. Also, looking for a new job is probably not the solution as those dissatisfied with their lifes will probably find something wrong with the new job, too.

So, what can you do? Psychologists still discuss and research the genetic component of happiness. However, it’s never genes alone.

People, who are unhappy in life and in their jobs have most likely learned certain thinking styles, behaviors, and expectations that hinder them to achieve happiness. Possible causes could be for example black and white thinking and perfectionism (if it’s not perfect, it’s awful), unrealistic expectations, focusing on negative aspects and neglecting positive events and so forth.

The good news: As these thinking styles, behaviors and expectations are learned, they can be unlearned.