Four culture and management students from the HSZG organized a social experiment on the topic of "Meaning and Happiness".
Four culture and management students from the Zittau/Görlitz University of Applied Sciences organized an event on the topic of "Meaning and Happiness" under the direction of Maik Hosang in order to analyse the views of young adults and stimulate discussions.
The project was conceived as part of the "Cultural Philosophy and Aesthetics" module and realized by John Ledzbor, Selina Henker, Sophie Starke and Romy Wolf. Student Romy Wolf reports on the project:
After defining the details, making contact and consulting with the people responsible at our university, we designed a centrally located open space in front of the canteen on our campus. We made a collage of chalk drawings. To do this, we collected generic terms for "meaning and happiness in life" and placed them on the ground in the form of symbolic drawings. Our categories, to which we could later assign ourselves, were:
Family, friendship, hobbies, vacation, environment, profession, wealth and success, social commitment, love, religion and finally freedom.
We encouraged students from our university and children from the nearby elementary school to take part in our little social experiment by posting notices that did not fully describe the purpose of our campaign, but rather simply asked which of the drawings represented happiness or meaning in their lives. In order to be able to assess later which symbols and categories were most important to our participants, we provided them with chalk so that they could draw a line in the empty boxes provided. Then it was time for us to observe.
The first reactions from students soon became apparent. They ranged from "That's cool and profound!" to "I'm out of that age" and "They drew on everything with chalk ... like children!". We had hoped for more positive reactions. But to our great delight, more and more passers-by got involved, took the chalk in their hands, thought about it and drew their lines on the symbols that were most important to them.
We were particularly impressed by reactions to the question "Where is the meaning of life, philosophically?" and the photos taken by participants. As the campus of our university is open to the public and the canteen is also used by external visitors, many passers-by were able to get involved. A large group of children from the nearby elementary school finally discovered our painted floor area and literally pounced on the chalk. They quickly drew their lines and eagerly added new small drawings.
The career aspiration "firefighter" and the material leisure activities with "Lego" and "Nintendo" brought a smile to many passers-by, but we were particularly moved by the categories of friendship, family and environment that the children looked at. New small pictures were created for almost every category, bringing our entire work to life. More and more categories emerged, for example "Fantasy", "Food" and a little platypus, which fortunately was also approved by four strokes.
Our participants identified the most meaning and happiness in their lives with friendship (17 votes), freedom (16 votes), food and the environment (15 votes each). Religion (3 votes), wealth (5 votes), fantasy and education (7 votes each) received the least approval.
We were particularly struck by the fact that children approached our campaign much more open-mindedly and freely and enjoyed answering questions, thinking about the topic and contributing their thoughts than young adults, who were probably less open and motivated due to the spirit of the times, the ever-increasing fast pace of life and the shift in personal priorities caused by external influences such as money and pressure to perform.
However, we are sure that even those who did not want to get involved at least thought about the topic for a moment and perhaps reflected on their thoughts and goals - at least that is what we sincerely hope.
Thanks to the conspicuous appearance of our campaign, we certainly succeeded in drawing attention to the topic of "meaning and happiness", which we would also like to see in general. We are therefore completely satisfied with this social experiment and think that it was definitely worthwhile for us.
And which categories would you have prioritized?
The report on the social experiment was recently published in the national portal "Purpose - Das Magazin für Sinnhaftigkeit".
