Coprolite Newsletter, April 2008

Most people have the idea that happiness throughout life follows the usual bell-shaped curve. After all, we seem pretty unhappy when we’re very young (crying at bedtime and all that). Then there’s the storm and stress period of teenage angst. We ought to be happiest in our 40s, after we’ve settled into marriage and career and are poised to make our fortune. In later years comes the inevitable descent into decrepitude, which seems too depressing to think about.

Actually, it works in just the opposite way. Instead of a bell-shaped curve, happiness follows a U-shaped curve The happiest times are at the early and late ages and the unhappiest years are in the middle. American men are least happy at age 49, American women at 45. Strangely enough, it’s not just codgers like me who are making that claim. It’s a scientific fact.

David Blanchflower from Dartmouth College and Andrew Oswald from the University of Warwick in the UK published a paper on the subject. They analyzed statistics from the U.S. General Social Survey from 1974 to 2004 and the Eurobarometer surveys from 1975 to 1998.

These surveys included the incredible total of 500,000 people from the U.S., France, Belgium, Netherlands, West Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, Ireland, Great Britain, Greece, Spain, and Portugal. With that many people reporting, there can’t be much doubt: The further you are from middle age, the happier you are.

Why do people my age get happier as time goes on? The researchers suggested that one possibility is the likelihood that we eventually learn to adapt to our strengths and weaknesses, and thereby come to terms with the goals we’re not going to accomplish in life. Another possibility is that happy people just tend to live longer, and so those of us who are still around to answer questionnaires in our 60s and beyond were just overly cheerful to begin with. A third reason they mention is that at this stage we’ve seen so much tragedy in our lives that we put greater value on what few blessings we have left.

Do any of those sound like a reason to be deliriously happy? I don’t think so either. In that case, what’s the real answer?

I think we have to look at both the high and low ends of that U-shaped curve in order to understand what makes people happiest at those extremes.

My feeling is that folks at retirement age are sort of comparable to those in their mid to late teens. Both groups are embarking on a new and exciting stage in life. They’re looking forward to having more freedom than before. They’re able to travel more freely, either because they’ve just gotten their first driver’s license or because their AARP discount saves money on cruises.

Those in their seventies are even happier, as are the kids around age ten or so. Nobody expects you to do much, so life is pretty carefree. The people around you are the same people you’ve loved for as long as you can remember. And it’s okay to indulge in games and hobbies as much as you like.

For those in their eighties and above, life is like the incredibly happy times of a pre-schooler. When you get up in the morning, life is a blank slate, to do with as you wish. Play games, romp in the garden, watch cartoons, or sit and do nothing. Anything is permitted. And everybody talks to you in a voice full of exaggerated cheerfulness. What’s not to be happy about?

I can only imagine the unlimited happiness and contentment experienced by centenarians and toddlers.

So if you’re at the stage mistakenly called the prime of life, all I can say is that my sympathies are with you. If you’re in your first or second childhood, congratulations!

––Wayne Adams
wayne@coprolites.com

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