May 9, 2008 9:49 AM
Harvard prof says children bring unhappiness
From today's UK Telegraph - a Harvard professor declares that children ruin our chances at happiness:
Marriage without children the key to bliss
By Kate Devlin, Medical Correspondent
May 9, 2008Married life is the key to happiness, but having children can ruin it all, an international conference has been told.
Couples only recover their former blissful existence once their offspring have left the nest, according to an expert on what creates joy.
Daniel Gilbert, professor of psychology at Harvard University, said studies across America and Europe had shown that while feelings of happiness spike during the early years of marriage, they fall heavily after having children.
He told a Happiness and its Causes conference in Sydney that parents’ desire to get a return on the time and money they have invested in their children is part of the reason they persuade themselves that their offspring are enhancing their lives.
Read entire article here. I am happy the writer strove for balance by ending with this:
But some experts believe that it not having children itself which breed the discontent.Richard Tunney, assistant professor of psychology at the University of Nottingham, said: “From an evolutionary point of view we are programmed to procreate.
“It would not make sense for having children to make us unhappy.
“However, in countries like Britain having children is hard - your finances are hit, childcare in this country is appalling and for women especially, their careers suffer.
“That is not the fault of having children per se, but of society.”
He added that “of course” couples were less happy after having children than in the early years of their marriage, when they were “in the first flushes of romantic love and had more money”.
But the two feelings could not be compared, he said, “they are two different types of emotion”.
This hasn't hit the U.S. print media yet. But what ironic timing - two days before Mother's Day.
You can count on some encouragement here in what I plan to post today and tomorrow.
Posted in Current Affairs, Mothering | Permalink
Comments
How sad. Couples who don't have children are missing out on SO MUCH. In fact, I'd go so far to say they have a tendency to never grow up. By that I mean they never truly learn to look outside themselves, to sacrifice themselves and be happy to do it. (This is not true in every case, of course.) Perhaps that's why secularists hate the idea of having children. It is, ultimately, a Christ-like thing to do.
Posted by: Kristina | May 9, 2008 10:17 AM
Dear Barbara,
Here is a great blog post, written by a Catholic convert that gives a great contrasting point of view to the above article:
http://www.conversiondiary.com/2008/05/getting-my-life-back.html
Posted by: Mary | May 9, 2008 10:54 AM
It's such a shame so many people live in a backward world. Seeking happiness by not bringing children into your marriage is like trying to fill your belly without eating. It makes no sense, except that anyone who has *not* actually had children and raised them just can't know the truth of it anyway.
The whole idea that "in countries like Britain having children is hard" is also absurd. Sure, there are financial concerns, but if you take a step back and see Iraq, for instance, or any of various African nations, you might change your tune. These people tend to have more children per family and money is the least of their worries.
We in the west are very blessed and the only way to feel happiness is to recognize those blessings and share them. I suppose, though, that the selfish will be their own downfall...
Posted by: queenmommy911 | May 9, 2008 11:35 AM
When I read the headline, my first thought was that God doesn't promise to make us happy in THIS life - children or no children.
And I think hard times with one's children make one a better person, Barbara's experience with her daughter as an example.
My husband and I had our daughter 9 months after we got married. And then our son 14 months after that. We would have more money, more time, and less arguments without them, but we are definitely not less happy.
We're people bettered by doing God's will, which means work. And kids are work! :) But a work for the greater good rather than oneself. Work doesn't make people unhappy. What they are working for makes people unhappy.
We live in a culture of stuff rather than people. Culture-wide, kids are seen as work and money invested, rather than having worth in and of themselves. You don't get your investment in your kids back from your kids immediately in day to day life.
Your fulfillment comes much later and lasts for an eternity.
Posted by: Meg | May 9, 2008 12:14 PM
Wow! Perhaps those two old friends from college who both separately told me that I am living the life they wished for were just patronizing me because they are blissful without children and I am miserable?
It's funny when you have experts who truly don't understand something coming out and telling those of us living the life they don't understand that we are miserable. It's as if they have to TELL us that we are miserable because we're too dumb to realize how miserable we are.
Perhaps it is just another way to scare a younger generation out of having children. After all, there is that whole zero population thing that the "experts" would like to push.
If only I had known I was miserable...
Posted by: Jeanne | May 9, 2008 12:16 PM
Those who deliberately don't have children are the ones to be concerned about and their attitudes. There are many couples who have never been able to have children of their own, even after many years, who would have welcomed them. There are two couples, both around age 60 so past childbearing age, in our church who have no children of their own and have made wonderful "aunts & uncles" of themselves to many of the young people and children in our church too (us included.)
Posted by: Mrs. Gillet | May 9, 2008 3:06 PM
Wow. What a very shallow and short-term point of view. As if happiness depended on 'getting a return on the money you've invested in your children'... as if happiness mattered!
There's a big, stinkin' difference between temporary happiness (which apparently is generated by money, access to good childcare, and careers for women) and the (sometimes delayed) gratification of hearing the words "well done, good and faithful servant, now enter in to your master's rest". Or the precious words, "I love you Mama".
And I doubt all their money will be much comfort to them when they are old, weak, and alone, with no children or grand-children to care for them.
What a self-centered point of view!
Posted by: Julie | May 9, 2008 3:20 PM
I'd like to see the actual statistics. I've read in a number of places that marriages without kids are "happier." The numbers are what they are and shouldn't taken as an attack on those that have children or those that don't. Children are many things: blessings, burdens, sources of joy, sources of stress. Whether you choose to have them, choose not to have them, or weren't given the choice at all, go with God's plan for your life.
If God has plans for you have kids - Good, have them and be blessed!
If God doesn't have plans for you to have kids - Good, don't have them and be blessed!
Neither plan is self-centered or wrong. Differences are okay. We don't all have to follow the same path.
Posted by: Jill | June 1, 2008 7:36 PM
