Factor of happines

Western ethics
Western ethicists have made arguments for how humans should behave, either individually or collectively, based on the resulting happiness of such behavior. Utilitarians, such as John Stuart Mill and Jeremy Bentham, advocated the greatest happiness principle as a guide for ethical behavior.^[49]
Nietzsche
Friedrich Nietzsche critiqued the English Utilitarians' focus on attaining the greatest happiness, stating that "Man does not strive for happiness, only the Englishman does".^[50] Nietzsche meant that making happiness one's ultimate goal and the aim of one's existence, in his words "makes one contemptible." Nietzsche instead yearned for a culture that would set higher, more difficult goals than "mere happiness." He introduced the quasi-dystopic figure of the "last man" as a kind of thought experiment against the utilitarians and happiness-seekers. these small, "last men" who seek after only their own pleasure and health, avoiding all danger, exertion, difficulty, challenge, struggle are meant to seem contemptible to Nietzsche's reader. Nietzsche instead wants us to consider the value of what is difficult, what can only be earned through struggle, difficulty, pain and thus to come to see the affirmative value suffering and unhappiness truly play in creating everything of great worth in life, including all the highest achievements of human culture, not least of all philosophy.^[51][52]
Changes in focus over time
In 2004 Darrin McMahon claimed, that over time the emphasis shifted from the happiness of virtue to the virtue of happiness.^[53]
Culture
Personal happiness aims can be effected by cultural factors.^[54][55][56] Hedonism appears to be more strongly related to happiness in more individualistic cultures.^[57]
One theory is that higher SWB in richer countries is related to their more individualistic cultures. Individualistic cultures may satisfy intrinsic motivations to a higher degree that collectivistic cultures, and fulfilling intrinsic motivations, as opposed to extrinsic motivations, may relate to greater levels of happiness, leading to more happiness in individualistic cultures.^[58]
Cultural views on happiness have changed over time.^[59] For instance Western concern about childhood being a time of happiness has occurred only since the 19th century.^[60]
Not all cultures seek to maximize happiness,^{[61][nb 2][nb 3]} and some cultures are averse to happiness.^[62][63]
Religion
See also: Religious studies
People in countries with high cultural religiosity tend to relate their life satisfaction less to their emotional experiences than people in more secular countries.^[64]