Happiness is the Purpose to Life - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 3 Words: 753 Downloads: 1 Date added: 2019/04/22 Category Society Essay Level High school Tags: Happiness Essay Did you like this example? Happiness is the meaning and purpose to life, the whole aim, and end to human existence, said Aristotle more than 2,000 years ago. Happiness seems to always be the goal in our lives but what is the secret or key to it? It seems almost impossible to construct or make a plan to have a confirmed happy life. A Harvard study started in 1938 has made some insight to some secrets that not all of us may have realized. During the Great Depression in 1938, Harvard scientists took 268 physically and mentally healthy Harvard sophomores for a longitudinal study on happiness. This study included no females because, at the time, Harvard was an all-male school. This first study was known as the Grant Study There was a second study named The Glueck Study where the directors took 456 inner-city Boston men and studied them. These subjects happened to be a bit poorer than the Harvard subjects. Starting in 1939, a year after the Grant Study began, having the second control group helped scie ntists examine the differences between the two upcoming. This determines whether or not, money is a factor in happiness. Information on the subjects was gathered by personal interviews. Questions included were on career enjoyment, physical and mental health, retirement, their marriage quality. The goal of the study was to more or less, identify predictors of healthy aging. Scientists studied what psychosocial variables biological processes in childhood could predict the outcomes of older age. If that earlier lifetime could affect intimate relationships and marriage in the future. In this first generation study, scientists found in their subjects that relationships were one of the key factors in their health and well-being. The surprising finding is that our relationships and how happy we are in our relationships have a powerful influence on our health, said Robert Waldinger, director of the study, a psychiatrist at Massachusetts General Hospital and a professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. Taking care of your body is important, but tending to your relationships is a form of self-care too. That, I think, is the revelation. It was studied that relationships took over happiness more than fame or money. This was found in both studies. They also found other small results, such as alcoholism was a disorder. It was the main cause of divorces between The Grant Study men and their wives. It also found that instead of depression or neurosis being the cause of alcohol abuse it tended to precede it instead. Linked to cigarettes, this was the number one contributor to death. Another result found that financial success has nothing to do with intelligence, but depends on the warmth of their relationships. There was no significant difference between the incomes of men with low IQs versus men with high IQs. But those considered with high warm relationships earning about one hundred and forty-four thousand dollars more a year during their peak salaries than those not measuring high in warm relationships. One of the most interesting results was that those close with their mothers in childhood had a better work ethic, and earned an average of eighty-seven thousand dollars a year, more than those who were uncaring with their mothers. Those who were cold towards their mothers were more likely to get dementia when they were older as well. Men who were closer to their father as a child were less likely to have adult anxiety. They also enjoyed vacations or relaxing more. And unlike men being close to their mothers, they had increased life satisfaction at age seventy-five. Warmth in relationships had ultimately been the biggest factor in life satisfaction. George Eman Vaillant, another psychiatrist, and professor at Harvard Medical School, and director on the study wrote three books on the studies and concluded that Happiness is love. Full stop. Today, the studies continue on. Nineteen of the original subjects still live on to this day in their mid-nineties. The study has been going on for more than eighty years and is the longest study of adult life. The second generation study is in effect as well. This includes the first two studies offspring, which totals about 1,300 subjects who are now in their 50s and 60s. This study has and continues to prove that happiness is as simple as having long and lasting warm relationships. People who are close with their family have a greater chance of living long and prosperous and being the most satisfied with their lives. So maybe that long phone call with your mom doesnt sound too bad now, huh? Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Happiness is the Purpose to Life" essay for you Create order