The human brain processes both social approval and financial gain in much the same way, both of which provide well-being and happiness , so many of the things we do in life have the purpose of achieving these two goals.
Although the adjectives “rich” and “famous” tend to go hand in hand, many people decide to pursue fame even if it does not bring financial benefits (as is the case of a marching band with its small community of followers). On the contrary, there are those who prefer enrichment even if it means carving out a bad reputation.
This happens because, as far as the brain’s reward system is concerned, there is not much difference between the one and the other. Therefore, we may be able to choose only one goal, even if the other never arrives. However, as the psychologist Dean Burnett explains in his book The Happy Brain , fame is possibly a little more rewarding than material wealth, although it is also more difficult to measure and involves many contraindications.
Both money and fame bring us pleasure because they ultimately serve to give us a greater chance of survival. However, money only makes us happy up to a certain point, after which its influx begins to diminish.
This is not the case with the approval of others , which seems to act at many levels of cognition. Just take a look at social networks, especially Instagram or YouTube, to discover millions of people claiming a small amount of attention and approval (in the form of hearts or likes ).
The point is, unlike money, fame cannot be easily quantified. How much is a lot of fame? A thousand followers? One million? Also, most people have had a stroke of luck that has allowed them to make money, so they know what it feels like, but what must it feel like when your popularity increases massively?
Also, as Burnett points out: “We can give an accurate estimate of a person’s height, weight, or wealth, but not how famous they are, as this is a much more vague and subjective property.”
And while having more money allows you to be richer, being more famous does not necessarily promote social approval. The more famous a person is, in fact, the greater the legion of haters who turn against him. A celebrity, moreover, will hardly be able to relate to most people in an authentic way, from you to you, because there is a great admiration that can come to boycott the spontaneity of the relationship itself .
The most famous people, in fact, can become the loneliest in the sense of not being able to establish close and sincere social interactions with others.
In addition, celebrities are often under pressure to interact with many people and socialize more than usual, which is also a psychological strain : “From that perspective, it is not surprising that some famous men and women appear cold, distant and even dry with his fans and admirers; it is not necessarily a show of personal contempt or arrogance, but a desperate attempt to protect their sanity, their well-being and their happiness ”.
In other words, the well-being that fame produces is not without its counterproductive effects and unavoidable nuances, as is also the case with material wealth. We feel compelled to seek positive social interactions, and therefore social rejection produces unease; however, mass approval will not make us any happier . Because the quality of social approval matters more than the quantity, in a similar way to what happens with material wealth.
