Childhood really is the happiest time of our lives with satisfaction levels declining after the age of nine, a new study reveals.
Psychologists looked at three markers, life satisfaction, positive emotional states and negative emotional states.
Positive emotional states declined from age nine to 94. Negative emotional states fluctuated slightly between ages nine and 22, then declined until age 60 and then increased once again.
However, life satisfaction decreased between the ages of nine and 16, then increased slightly until the age of 70, and then decreased once again until the age of 96.
The team from the Ruhr-University Bochum in Germany examined trends in subjective well-being over the lifespan based on 443 samples from longitudinal studies with a total of 460,902 participants.
Professor Susanne Bücker said: “We focused on changes in three central components of subjective well-being, life satisfaction, positive emotional states and negative emotional states.”
The researchers identified greater average changes in positive and negative emotional states than in life satisfaction.
Bücker added: “Overall, the study indicated a positive trend over a wide period of life, if we look at life satisfaction and negative emotional states.”
The researchers attribute the slight decline in life satisfaction between the ages of nine and 16 to, for example, changes to the body and to the social life that take place during puberty.
Satisfaction rises again from young adulthood onwards. Positive feelings tend to decrease from childhood to late adulthood.
In very late adulthood, all components of subjective well-being tended to worsen rather than improve.
She added: “This could be related to the fact that in very old people, physical performance decreases, health often deteriorates, and social contacts diminish; not least because their peers pass away.”
The study highlights the need to consider and promote subjective well-being with its various components across the lifespan.
The findings, published in the journal Psychological Bulletin, could provide significant guidance for the development of intervention programs, especially those aimed at maintaining or improving subjective well-being late in life.
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