The happiness curve is collapsing.
For decades, the investigation showed that the way people experienced happiness in their lives looked like a U -shaped curve. Happiness tended to be high when they were young, then submerged in the middle age, only to rise again as they aged.
But recently, surveys suggest that young adults are not as happy as they used to be, and that the U -shaped curve is starting in plans.
This pattern has appeared once again in a new study, one of a collection of articles published on Wednesday in the Nature Mental Health magazine. They are the first publications based on the inaugural wave of data from the flourishing global study, a collaboration between researchers at Harvard University and Baylor.
The data, collected by Gallup mainly in 2023, were derived from self -informed surveys of more than 200,000 people in 20 countries. He discovered that, on average, young adults between the ages of 18 and 29 were fighting, not only with happiness, but also with their physical and mental health, their perceptions of their own character, finding meaning, the quality of quality. The researchers combined these measures to determine the degree to which each participant was “flourishing” or lived in a state where all aspects of life were good.
The study found that study participants had relatively low flowering measures up to 50 years. This was the case in several countries, including the United Kingdom, Brazil and Australia. But the difference between younger and older adults was greater in the United States, the researchers said.
“It is a fairly marked image,” said Tyler J. Vanderweele, the main author of the study and director of the Harvard Human Flourishing program. The findings raise an important question, he said: “Are we investing sufficiently in the well -being of youth?”
The adult age of adulthood has long been considered a carefree time, a period of unlimited opportunity and few obligations. But the data of the flourishing study and in other places suggest that for many people, this notion is more fantasy than reality.
A 2023 Harvard Report Graduate School of Education, for example, found that young adults between 18 and 25 years in the United States reported twice the anxiety and depression rates as adolescents. In addition to that, perfectionism has triggered among university students, who report that they feel pressure to meet non -reista expectations. Participation in community organizations, clubs and religious groups has decreased, and loneliness is becoming as frequent among young adults as in older adults.
“The study after the study shows that the social connection is fundamental to happiness, and young people spend less time with friends than a decade ago,” said Laurie Santos, a professor of Psychology at Yale and the podcast “The Happiness Lab”. “In addition, like people of all ages, young people face a world with a lot of world problems, from climate to economics and political polarization.”
Emiliana R. Simon-Thomas, the director of Sciences of the Greater Good Sciences Center of the University of California, Berkeley, expressed it in this way: “Our well-being depends on the well-being of each human other. Not only can we be happy and put a fence around us. “
In his opinion, the flourishing data reflects the “long -term consequences of being hyperfocated in the state and power”, especially in the USA, instead of a place within a larger community.
Since surveys were administered at different times, in different languages and in different economic, political and cultural environments, it is a challenge to directly compare the different countries, Dr. Ir. Vanderweele said. Although the geographical scope of the study was set, the current analysis does not include continental China, where data collection was delayed. In addition, low -income countries were not represented.
Not all countries saw a flourishing increase with age. There were some countries, such as Poland and Tanzania, where flowering really decreased as people grew. While others, including Japan and Kenya, showed the most traditional U -shaped pattern: the flowering was higher during youth and old age.
But in most Western countries, and in many others, young adults do not seem to bloom. The global flourishing study will continue to collect data annually until 2027 and try to discover the reasons, said Dr. Vanderweele.
“We know that young people are in trouble” David G. Blanchflower said, professor of economics at Dartmouth College who did not participate in the flourishing study, but whose research has discovered the same patterns.
Dr. Blanchflower is helping to organize a conference in Dartmouth in association with the United Nations so that experts can share research and ideas for solutions to the downward trend.
There are several theories about why young people are in trouble, he said, but The suspects that the problem is largely linked to what they No Doing because they are busy looking screens.
“It’s not that they are playing alone,” he added, referring to Robert D. Putnam’s seminal book, published 25 years ago, which he warned about the dangers of social isolation. “They are not bowling at all.”
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