Materialism and happiness (emotion)
So i follow a TOK website on facebook, and one of the articles they had posted lately is on the subject of materialism. This caught my interest as living in Korea, what i consider a highly materialistic country, it would maybe give me more understanding into the psychological factors of Korean society and its ongoing journey into an inescapable abyss of materialism.
One of the major emphasised points made in this article is the fact that materialistic individuals are generally less happy than those of less materialistic individuals. Straight away this brings emotion into the equation. Emotion has power over the way we, as individuals, view the world. I think its interesting that an object has the power to influence our emotions and even our physical health. In my opinion, people are trying to fill a void inside themselves with physical items in an effort to raise their self esteem and what others think of them, But this is the least effective way of achieving this, as stated by the article. So what should someone do in order to improve their emotional state? Another fact stated in the article, is the use of social networking sites and materialism are directly related. People who use social media in larger amounts tend to have a more materialistic personality. This may be because of the need for materialistic individuals to flaunt their possessions, otherwise what’s the point in being materialistic? This is in order to seek the appraisal from other people that the materialistic individual requires. almost like a high that doesn't actually help in anyway.
Is materialism a result of people being afraid of being rejected in society?
This is a strong TOK post. Keep going in your analysis and be sure to answer the knowledge questions you pose.
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