The Secret of Marital Happiness
 If
she's happy, then he's happy--and vice versa. Married men and women are
significantly more satisfied with their life when their spouse is also
satisfied with life, according to new research from Britain's
University of Warwick.
But
here's the really odd catch: This secret for happiness only works if
you're married. The same level of satisfaction was not found in couples
who live together without saying "I do."
It's long been widely
accepted, but rarely tested, that a married person is naturally happier
when his or her spouse is happy. Because of this assumption, it is
easier to think of marriage as an exchange in which two parties agree
to share, not only the material possessions of life but also the
experiences of good and bad times and other nonmaterial things that
matter to people's happiness, asserts lead researcher and economist
Nick Powdthavee.
The study: To
test the theory that there is a positive and significant effect of the
spouse's life satisfaction on the individual's own life satisfaction,
the Warwick team analyzed life satisfaction data from 9,704 married
people and 3,300 unmarried people who were living with their partner.
The data were part of the British Household Panel Survey, which was
conducted from 1996 to 2000 and in 2002. The participants, who were all
16 to 65 years old, were asked about life satisfaction, education,
income, and health.
The results: The effect is very real.
In fact it's sizable and statistically significant. Using a complex
mathematical formula, Powdthavee showed that when a husband or wife is
happy, that happiness extends to the spouse, too. It's so strong that
it can even supercede the non-financial cost of unemployment or a
two-month hospitalization. An example cited in the news release
announcing the findings indicated a 30 percent increase in the spouse's
life satisfaction score from the previous year can completely offset
the negative impact of unemployment on the respondent's life
satisfaction.
The takeaway: Happiness is contagious for married
couples.
The interesting gotcha: To
reap the same level of happiness, you have to be married. When the test
was conducted on those who were living together but not married, it
starkly showed there was not the same robust evidence of life
satisfaction. The study findings were presented to the Royal Economic
Society's Annual Conference.
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