Are People In Relationships Happier?

Someone asked me at the weekend if it was true that people in relationships are happier than those who are single.

“It can’t be true” she said “some of the happiest people I know are divorced”.

From a personal point of view, if I think about the happy people that I know – they are mostly in stable relationships. I can also recall the changes I have seen in so many of those I have worked with when they finally found their perfect match. They have been outwardly more positive, more content and yes, happier.

Most physiologists also tend to agree that we are happier in relationships than we are when we are single. Of course there are exceptions – there are bad relationships just like there are bad apples, or bad hair days. But a good relationship makes us happy.

People in relationships live longer (forget all the old jokes about it just FEELING longer). Marriage apparently adds around seven years to the life of a man and four to the life of a woman. Figures for those who live together are similar.

A recent study in the US found that people in the “top 10 per cent of happiness” were almost entirely involved in a stable, romantic relationship.

So why are people in relationships happier?

Well for a start it takes one item off of your parents list of how you have failed to live up to their expectations.

It also means that there is someone who feels obliged to listen to how bad your day at work was.

But being in a relationship gives you the opportunity to share.

Share concerns. Share dreams. Share plans.

It gives you someone to care about – and someone who, hopefully, cares about you.

You look out for each other. Support each other. You are there for each other.

It gives you someone you can depend on, someone you can trust, someone you can confide in.

As human beings – we need these things. We need them to help us feel secure, to help us feel content.

If we are secure and content in ourselves we can approach life much more confidently. We can be happier.

The paradox is that when we are in a relationship - we often find it very easy to make each other miserable – nine times out of ten over really trivial stuff.

Sometimes it is not until we lose the relationship that we realise that the good things massively outweighed the bad – and that a lot of the stuff we argued over was completely insignificant.

So yes – in response to the question. I do believe that those of us in stable relationships are genuinely happier than those of us who are single.

But I also believe that sometimes, we get complacent, and we can all do ourselves a favour by taking a step back - appreciating the good things in our relationship – and stop getting worked up about things that don’t’really matter that much.


Robert Burns