Stiffness of the joints, deterioration of vision, increasingly poor memory, lack of understanding of new things do not bode well, and these are exactly what comes to mind when we think of the elderly. But how wrong we are if we think about aging negatively, because we have realized that there is nothing better.
yo happy
like It turns out, U-shaped life more than slow decline. For at the beginning of youth, everyone is cheerful, optimistic, and the king of parties, and then there is a decline until a midlife crisis, but as old age slowly approaches, the sanguine self rises again. Although vitality and resilience decrease, we become happier and happier as we reconcile, accept, and forgive.
This strange discovery came from the science of economics, because some researchers decided to find the source of happiness – and it is not money.
Not the first time, since last year, Nicolas Sarkozy has also asked two Nobel Prize-winning economists, Amartya Sen and Joseph Stiglitz, to come up with a measure of national satisfaction broader than GDP. But in Britain, David Cameron also announced that the government would start collecting data on happiness.
Many survey companies have already collected data on how people judge their lives (global well-being) and how they feel at a particular time (emotional well-being).
The big question is what makes people happy?
Four main factors were included in the study: gender, personality, external conditions and age. Women tend to be a little happier than men. But they are also more likely to be depressed, with one in five people experiencing depression in their lifetime, compared to about a tenth of men. This indicates that women are more likely to experience more extreme emotions.
Personality traits and circumstances (relationships, education, income, health) can also predispose to happiness. But age also matters, with 30-year-olds reporting less happiness than those 70-year-olds, as measured by Peter Opel of Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy.
This is where the representation of life as a turn came from, which could be typical of all countries on Earth. David Blanchflower, professor of economics at Dartmouth College, and colleagues analyzed data from 72 countries.
The nadir varies by country — Ukrainians feel miserable at 62, Swiss at 35 — but in most countries people are most unhappy in their early 40s and younger years.
According to global surveys, pleasure and happiness decrease and then rise in middle age, stress increases in the early twenties and then declines sharply, anxiety peaks in middle age and then declines sharply thereafter, anger decreases linearly throughout life, and sadness increases A little middle-aged and then refuses.
True happiness comes from the age of 46
By then, we get rid of stress and anxiety, and the happy B-side comes. According to studies, happiness after the age of 46 is not due to external circumstances (material, profession), but to internal changes.
Older adults (although we didn’t include 47-year-olds here) are able to control their emotions better, accept their fate, and be less angry.
This can be because we become aware of our own mortality over time and see more clearly what’s important, what’s worth getting angry about (almost none), and accept our weaknesses, strengths, and limitations, says Laura Carstensen, a professor of psychology at Stanford University.
In addition, this delayed happiness makes people healthier.
John Weinman, a psychiatrist at King’s College London, monitored the stress levels of a group of volunteers and then gave them small cuts. Less stressful wounds heal 2 times faster than the most stressful wounds.
At Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Sheldon Cohen infected people with cold and flu viruses. It found that happier people were less likely to contract the virus and showed fewer symptoms of the disease when infected. Therefore, although the elderly are generally less healthy than the younger ones, their cheerfulness can help compensate for their physical weakness.
