Is youth really the happiest time of life?

Researchers who surveyed younger and older adults found that both believe that, as a general rule, happiness declines with age. But when it came to their own experience, the older adults described themselves as happier than the younger people did.

The study, led by Heather P. Lacey of the Veterans Affairs Ann Arbor Healthcare System and the University of Michigan, appears in The Journal of Happiness Studies.

The researchers asked 540 people, one group ages 21 to 40 and the other over 60, to assess their current state of happiness. They were also asked, depending on their age, to recall or predict how happy they were at 30 and again at 70. 

Most said that with age came decreasing happiness. But the findings from this study, as well as others that the researchers cited, suggested that there was little evidence to support that.

"Beliefs about aging are important," the researchers write. "If younger adults mispredict old age as miserable, they may make risky decisions, not worrying about preserving themselves for what they predict will be an unhappy future.

"Conversely, exaggerating the joys of youth may lead to unwarranted nostalgia in older adults, interfering with their appreciation of current joys," they wrote.

Measuring happiness can be a tricky business. Despite popular belief, most older people describe themselves as happy. (Other studies have shown that even very sick people often report surprising levels of happiness.)

"One possibility is, of course, that they are really happier," Dr. Lacey said.

But it may also be that by the time people are older, they are better equipped to deal with adversity, perhaps because they have more perspective.

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