REVISITING ASYMMETRIC CAUSAL LINK BETWEEN HAPPINESS AND SMOKING IN JAPAN

Smoking and happiness both can affect health. A complex question on whether there is correlation between smoking and happiness cannot be simply examined by symmetric methodology. Japan is one of the country with the large smoking population in Asia. This paper reexamines the relationship between happiness and smoking in Japan over the period from 1961-2003, using an asymmetric Granger causality test proposed by Hatemi-J [1]. Empirical results indicate asymmetric Granger causal relationship did exist between happiness and smoking behaviour in Japan. Our results have important policy implications in Japan.