Many survey-based studies have been conducted to try to understand how happiness changes over a person’s lifetime. While there have been a few different outcomes, the most common has been the U-shaped curve. This pattern indicates that, on average, people are happier at the beginning of adulthood, they experience a dip during midlife (the so-called “midlife crisis”), and happiness then increases again in old age. Yet, other similar studies have reported inconsistent patterns—steady happiness throughout life, steady increases, steady decreases or even inverse U-shapes.
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