Quite simply what makes men happy

Quite simple: what makes men happy

31/10/2014

Some people are looking for their own happiness throughout their lives. For men, there is a simple answer to how they can be happy with their relationship and life in general. Psychologists in the US have now found out. This is not so simple for women.

Men are happy when their partner is happy
Football, cars, pub nights: When asked what makes men happy, many men's magazines or other supposed experts often find answers with rather limited creativity. For women's magazines, this is usually not great. As a new study from the US has now found, it is actually quite easy to make men happy. The so-called strong sex feels lucky when their partners are happy. The results of the investigation were recently published in the journal „Journal of Marriage and Family“ released.

Data analyzed by older couples
The psychologists came to their conclusions by analyzing the data of nearly 400 couples, in which at least one of the partners was older than 60 years and the couple had been married for an average of 39 years. Deborah Carr of Rutgers - The State University of New Jersey and Vicki Freedman of the University of Michigan and their colleagues, according to a report of the „world“, what influence the partners' assessments had on other people's well-being and satisfaction with marriage. For example, it was recorded how often partners were arguing, whether they felt valued by each other or if they could usually understand the feelings of others.

Women often bear greater burdens in the relationship
As it turned out, for both sexes, those who rated their relationship as very good generally considered themselves happier. However, there was also an effect of the partner's happiness on their own happiness, and this differed between men and women. Thus, a husband was happy with the relationship and life when the partner was satisfied with her marriage. This was not the other way around. A husband happy with his marriage did not necessarily have a wife who was happy. According to the scientists, the reason seems to be that women are often more burdened with relationships than men.

Happy couples get sick less often
Further analysis showed that the woman's happiness suffered significantly when her husband became ill, which is not uncommon in old age. However, her husband's luck did not have much of an impact on his partner's illness. „We know that women tend to take care of their partner when he is ill, which of course is stressful“, so Carr. „But when the woman gets sick, it is often not her husband who takes care of her, but her daughter.“ As the „world“ the researchers had looked at older couples, as a good relationship is always something nice, but in old age is particularly important when it comes to health. According to Carr, a good marriage is a good protection factor. Happy partners become less ill and cope with stressful events better.

Positive emotions and joy of life
The fact that happiness can prolong life has also been proven in various studies. An analysis of 160 studies on happiness and health conducted years ago by researchers from the University of Illinois. An essential finding was that positive emotions and zest for life are good for the health and extend the lifespan, stress, however, should be avoided as far as possible. When women take care of themselves and their needs, according to the latest study, this is not only a guarantee of their own happiness, but also that of their husbands. The man, in turn, can indirectly seek his own happiness by caring more about what makes his wife happy. Actually, very simple. (Ad)