Happiness makes you live longer

People who rated themselves as happy were far less likely to die over a five year period than those who said they were unhappy, according to a British study. Researchers asked 3,800 people aged between 52-79 to rate their happiness and found the happiest people had over one third (35%) less chance of dying in the next five years than the unhappiest. The University College London study involved the participants recording their levels of happiness or anxiety four times a day. The researchers then recorded the number of deaths over five years. They also took into account the effect of age, illness, depression and gender when calculating the figures. After five years only 3.6% of the happiest people involved in the study had died, compared to 7.3% of the unhappiest. Prof. Andrew Steptoe, who led the study, said: "The happiness could be a marker of some other aspect of people''s lives which is particularly important for health." "For example, happiness is quite strongly linked to good social relationships, and maybe it is things like that that are accounting for the link between happiness and health."