What do we wish most for our children? Next to being healthy, we want them to be happy, of course! Fortunately, a wide array of scientific studies show that happiness is a learned behavior, a muscle we can help our children build and maintain.
Drawing on what psychology, sociology, and neuroscience have proven about confidence, gratefulness, and optimism, and using her own chaotic and often hilarious real-world adventures as a mom to demonstrate do’s and don’ts in action, Christine Carter, Ph.D, executive director of UC Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center, boils the process down to 10 simple happiness-inducing steps.
With great wit, wisdom, and compassion, Carter covers the day-to-day pressure points of parenting—how best to discipline, get kids to school and activities on time, and get dinner on the table—as well as the more elusive issues of helping children build healthy friendships and develop emotional intelligence. In these 10 key steps, she helps you interact confidently and consistently with your kids to foster the skills, habits, and mindsets that will set the stage for positive emotions now and into their adolescence and beyond. Inside you will discover
• the best way avoid raising a brat—changing bad habits into good ones
• tips on how to change your kids’ attitude into gratitude
• the trap of trying to be perfect—and how to stay clear of its pitfalls
• the right way to praise kids—and why too much of the wrong kind can be just as bad as not enough
• the spirit of kindness—how to raise kind, compassionate, and loving children
• strategies for inspiring kids to do boring (but necessary) tasks—and become more self-motivated in the process
Complete with a series of “try this” tips, secrets, and strategies,
Raising Happiness is a one-of-a-kind resource that will help you instill joy in your kids—and, in the process, become more joyful yourself.
Christine Carter, Ph.D., is the executive director of the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley, an interdisciplinary research center that “translates” the study of happiness, compassion, and altruism for the public. A regular on ABC’s
View from the Bay talk show, Carter has been profiled in a
San Francisco Chronicle Magazine cover story and quoted in dozens of national online and print publications including
The New York Times, The Boston Globe, American Baby, and
Parenting. The mother of two young girls, she lives near San Francisco.
"
Raising Happiness is an elegant, funny, and rigorous handbook for the humbling task of raising joyful children. Brimming with brilliantly distilled science, poignant stories from her family, and what parents so urgently seek—clear, practical, and informed guidance—it is an encyclopedia of wisdom for raising children in today's multitasking, multimedia world. Christine Carter offers thoughtful approaches to raising more grateful, playful, mindful children and she provides practical tips for how to handle the conflicts of siblings, the challenges of the new media, and countering the pressures of perfectionism and materialism. In reading this engaging book, you are very likely to find yourself a bit happier as well." —Dacher Keltner, author
Born To Be Good: The Science of A Meaningful Life, Professor of Psychology, University of California, Berkeley
"This is THE parenting book. This is the one to read over and over. So much wisdom and empathy, all based in real science. My children owe Christine Carter big time."—Kelly Corrigan, author,
The Middle Place
