MARRIED PEOPLE ARE HAPPIER STATISTICS PROVE ....

National Statistics released this week reveal that married people and those in civil partnerships rate their 'life satisfaction', the sense that their activities are 'worthwhile' and 'happiness yesterday' significantly higher than cohabiting couples, single, divorced and widowed people.

The research, based on the annual Population Survey collected between April 2011 and March 2012 show that single people rated their 'happiness yesterday' on an average 0.4 of a point lower than those who are married or in civil partnerships.

Summary of findings on age, sex, ethnicity, migration and religion

Holding other factors equal:

• Personal well-being is highest among younger and older adults and dips in middle age
• Differences in personal well-being between men and women are small, but women report higher ‘life satisfaction’, ‘worthwhile’ and 'happy yesterday’ levels.
• People of Black/African/Caribbean/Black British ethnicities rated their ’life satisfaction’ lower on average than White people.
• Indian and Pakistani people also rated their ‘anxiety yesterday’ higher than White people.
• People who have migrated to the UK rate their ‘life satisfaction’ and ‘happiness yesterday’ more highly on average than those who were born in the UK.
• Immigrants who settled in the UK more recently give slightly higher ratings for ’happy yesterday’ than those who have been living in the UK for 12 years or more.
• People who say that they have a religious affiliation rate their levels of ’happiness yesterday’, ‘life satisfaction’ and ‘worthwhile’ higher than people who said they have no religious affiliation.
• The size of relationship between religious affiliation and personal well-being is small.

Personal well-being, often referred to as subjective well-being, is people’s own assessment of their own well-being.

Many factors have been shown to be related to personal well-being such as health, disability, age, ethnic group, employment situation, relationships, religious beliefs and participation, etc.

The report can be viewed in full here