Ten years ago Caroline Ponting was a guinea pig in a pioneering BBC experiment to find permanent happiness. As a documentary revisits the participants, Brian Readhead finds out if she's still smiling.

CAROLINE Ponting is a far happier person today than she was ten years ago. Happier, some might say, than anyone has any right to be. But how she has achieved that state of mind is an intriguing story.

The 65-year-old divorcee puts her condition down to a milestone appearance in 1996 on a BBC television programme, when she became one of three volunteer guinea pigs in an eight-week experiment led by a psychologist known as the laughter doctor.

How To Be Happy, part of the QED documentary series, was devised to see whether the three could acquire and maintain happiness and to try to answer some of the scientific questions surrounding the state that seems to elude so many people.

They took part in a programme run by Robert Holden, a pioneer in positive psychology and well-being. Holden was also the director and founder of the Oxford-based Happiness Project and the author of ten books published in 14 languages. His clients include leading international companies as well as individuals ranging from entrepreneurs to sports people. He founded the first NHS laughter clinic in Birmingham in 1991.

Tonight Caroline, who lives at Bedale, North Yorkshire, meets Holden again for the first time in a decade when, as part of an unconnected six-part BBC series dealing with aspects of happiness, she tells him and reporter Mark Easton how she has fared since she faced up to what she has called her "demons".

Caroline was at a low ebb, and living in Harrogate, when she took part in the QED experiment. A naturally outgoing person, she had loved her job which involved meeting and greeting diners in a local seafood restaurant.

But her problems came when she was forced to give up work to look after her elderly mother, who had been severely disabled by a stroke. The strain produced by the isolation and effort involved in six years of full-time caring made Caroline the unhappiest of Holden's three volunteers at the start of the QED experiment, which was based on psychological questionnaires that revealed a score of minus 40.

Her condition was confirmed by a scientific scan conducted in America by Professor Richard Davidson, of Madison University, Wisconsin, to assess happiness levels on the side of the brain that registers pleasure.

She was at breaking point and the programme revealed a measure of resentment and bitterness at the way her life had turned out.

Contemporary reviewers noted a startling attitude towards her 92-year-old mother: "She's been with me, not out of affection, but out of duty. I don't feel love for her... I couldn't cuddle her."

Caroline's sparkle had gone. She felt trapped and unable to communicate. Her greatest wish was to feel a part of life and everyday people again.

The Holden experiment, to change the participants' brain chemistry, involved looking at belief patterns which prevented them from being happy. They included:

* encouragement of positive thinking

* sharing good news

* smiling into the mirror for two minutes at a time

* doing up to 30 minutes of physical exercise to produce a naturally high feeling by releasing endorphins in the system

* drawing up future life plans, ranging from a month to five years

Another prescription was to join a local Scottish dance society, where a ceilidh engendered fun and social cooperation.

As the workshops progressed, all three volunteers reported impressive improvements in their moods, Caroline's initial minus score was converted into a plus of 100. But at the end of the course, for harder scientific proof, Caroline returned to America to see Professor Davidson, whose second scan revealed that her brain pattern had shifted so dramatically that her happiness function ran off the graph. Caroline insisted after the programme that her life had been transformed, saying it was the little things in life that mattered: "Having the freedom to potter about as I please makes me happy. For someone else it may be material wealth or a sunny day, but having the chance to think about what I want out of life has renewed my faith in myself."

But how would she feel ten years later? Did Caroline achieve her aim of finding lasting happiness?

Four years ago, she moved to Bedale to be closer to her youngest daughter at nearby Hunton. Divorced for many years, she has had relationships but insists she does not feel the need to live with a partner. Her companions in a comfortable cottage in one of the oldest parts of Bedale are two black cats, given a new home when their previous carers moved to France three years ago.

Caroline's fellow QED volunteers were private investigator Dawn Harrison, who had moved with her family from Tyneside to Devon in search of contentment, and Keith Allen, from Weston-super-Mare, who had given up both the girlfriend he loved and a promising job as a sales executive. She has had no further contact with either. Caroline, whose mother died shortly after the programme was shown, says: "It worked for me but I am not saying it will work for everyone. Sometimes you need a bit of guidance to get back on track. Some people have other issues. You have to be honest with yourself about what is making you miserable. I was honest with myself. I met my demons, dismissed them one by one and they are out in the open.

"The experience was quite enjoyable because I found I was being motivated again. Some of the things I was asked to do ten years ago stuck in my mind. My self esteem was raised, I gained a more positive outlook on life and I think I have become a better person. Now I can recognise lots of good sides of myself. In many ways it was a revelation".

Caroline also backpacked around Australia and New Zealand on her own six years ago, which, she says, she would never have dreamed of doing before. She has travelled to Egypt and India, works at her local volunteer bureau and helps with meals on wheels. The experiment has worked for her. And what she has taken from the programme could be adapted into most people's lives.

"I am just enjoying life, befriending people and having fun with my family and grandchildren," she says. "Life gets shorter as you get older, so you have to make the most of it while you can."

*The Happiness Formula is on BBC2 tonight at 7pm.