November 18, 2009 3:12 PM
Study finds Married w/children happier
From Health Day: News for Healthier Living:Married With Children Paves Way to Happiness
Satisfaction with life goes up as family size increases, study finds
WEDNESDAY, Nov. 4 (HealthDay News) -- Want to be a happy married couple? Consider having kids.
A new study found that having children boosts happiness. And the more, literally, the merrier.
But unmarried couples shouldn't expect to find greater happiness through child-raising. The study, published in the Oct. 14 online edition of the Journal of Happiness Studies, suggests that having children has little or no effect on boosting happiness among couples who aren't hitched.
The findings contradict previous research that suggested that having more offspring doesn't lead to greater happiness and might even make people less satisfied with their lives. One theory behind the conclusion is that parents don't receive many rewards in return for the hard work of raising children.
The new study, however, notes that parents say children are one of the most important things in their lives, if not the most important.
The study found that life satisfaction for married people -- women especially -- goes up the more kids they have. Single, separated and co-habiting people, by contrast, report negative experiences.
"One is tempted to advance that children make people better off under the 'right conditions' -- a time in life when people feel that they are ready, or at least willing, to enter parenthood," Dr. Luis Angeles, of the University of Glasgow in Scotland, said in a news release from the journal's publisher. "This time can come at very different moments for different individuals, but a likely signal of its approach may well be the act of marriage."
HT: Alicia
Posted in Big families, Good news, Marriage, Pro-Life Issues | Permalink
Comments
The more children a couple have, the more they have to spend all of their waking moments looking after the needs of other people (their children).
Could it be that married couple with more children are happier because they really get the fact that life is not all about them?
Posted by: von | November 18, 2009 5:02 PM
Von, that is so true! I've also heard that people tend to become more conservative after they have kids. And that ties in with what you're saying. People with kids are more likely to see the big picture (circle of life) and therefore to believe in personal responsibility within the family unit.
Posted by: evergreen | November 19, 2009 12:20 PM
