
Most children are happy, but material deprivation catches up eventually - prostoalex
http://qz.com/405960/most-children-are-happy-no-matter-what-but-materialism-catches-up-eventually/
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jandrewrogers
Notice that this changes right around the age of puberty. Having grown up
quite poor, my hypothesis is straightforward.

Before you are a teenager, the things that make you happy and that you value
are largely disconnected from money. Happiness is more about the environment
not being pathological more than it is about having material goods. Children
invent their own happiness.

As a teenager, it becomes about the mating ritual. In that context, relative
material deprivation can have a significant adverse impact on the ability to
attract a quality mate. I would expect that in countries where it is
relatively easy to change your material position in society would have happier
adults than one where there was less opportunity because it gives the person
more ability to improve their outcomes on the mate selection front.

~~~
galago
My anecdotal experience as a suburban American completely supports this
explanation. I attended public schools with a variety of income levels
represented. I didn't notice I was poor until I was about 13 years old and
realized that I couldn't afford fashionable clothes. I would buy the brand
that kids were wearing, but I only had two or three outfits. I was astonished
that some of my peers would wear the 'cool' brand, but have different clothes
everyday.

~~~
newman314
A major reason why I'm for uniforms. Take all that petty cool clothes envy out
of the equation.

~~~
benihana
If it's not clothes, it'll be watches, shoes, smartphones, underwear, hats,
notebooks, whatever. Uniforms aren't going to stop teenagers in the midst of
puberty from competing with each other for status.

~~~
agumonkey
If every material thing get removed, you think it will end up as a competition
through physical and intellectual qualities ?

~~~
sukilot
Or arbitrary social bullying, like we have today.

------
rgbrenner
_However, the material deprivation seems to catch up eventually. If you
compare the relative rankings of children’s reported happiness with their
grown-up counterparts (pdf), the results change significantly._

Woah... what a leap. You really couldn't think of anything else that might
affect an adults happiness other than materialism?

Edit: Just checked the PDF.. it's the World Happiness Report. It does not say
what the article says.

~~~
Zancarius
I agree. I think this is one of those "correlation doesn't necessarily equal
causation" articles. I'm sure _some_ of it has to do with material items, but
I can't help after reading some of the comments here (markyc's comment on
Romania, for instance) that there are far more things at play: Cultural
values, adulthood stresses, etc. Not every culture places a strong emphasis on
material goods, and not every culture that is strongly materialistic is made
happy by material assets.

Out of curiosity, I had a look at some of the metrics on Wikipedia for
comparison. Colombia ranks 4th according to the adult "happiness index" (after
Germany) but 80th on the inequality-adjusted human development index and 98th
on the standard HDI--compared to Norway which ranks 1st in both metrics. I
can't say I know what this means, but from what I understand, I'd imagine that
countries higher on the HDI index therefore have more equal access to services
adults find important (like healthcare) and more equal income (and therefore
purchasing power) and "should" be happier. Likewise, these countries ought to
have greater access to material goods. (But, there's also the issue of who
they interviewed, their income levels, etc.)

I could be _completely_ wrong, but I just can't imagine that owning a plethora
of _things_ necessarily equates to increased happiness.

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bigtones
Could it be that children are just happier than adults, regardless of their
material assets. Adults have responsibilities and stresses that children do
not - and that is probably more of a causation than their material assets.

~~~
nostrademons
It could also be that happiness is strongly dependent upon where you stand
relative to the people around you. Children don't compare themselves to much
other than the immediate family, village, or neighborhood; they just don't
have the life experience to know how people in different cities throughout the
rest of the world live. Adults have had time to absorb cultural messages of
inferiority: these are all the things that your counterparts in America do
that you're missing out on. (Never mind that the Hollywood messages broadcast
around the globe tend to cherry-pick the most glamorous, outrageous lifestyles
and display them as normal.)

It takes a lot of deliberate mental practice to learn not to care about what
others have or what they might think of you, and few people bother.

~~~
iamcurious
_It takes a lot of deliberate mental practice to learn not to care about what
others have or what they might think of you, and few people bother._

Yes. We teach children to brush their teeth to avoid cavities. Maybe we should
also teach them to brush their minds to avoid anxiety.

~~~
Dewie3
> Maybe we should also teach them to brush their minds to avoid anxiety.

Isn't it children that should be teaching _us_ about that? :)

~~~
pixl97
Too bad it's mostly driven by marketers trying to make us more anxious about
what we don't have.

"Don't have the newest Timmy the Dinosaur toy? Your parents don't love you any
more!"

~~~
HeyLaughingBoy
As a parent with a 5 year-old and a 14 year-old, I assure you that the word
"no" is quite effective.

~~~
nostrademons
Even better is "See all those commercials in TV? They're all created by people
trying to tell you what to do. You don't like being told what to do, right? So
why let a stranger who just wants to make money off you tell you what to do?"

My parents gave me that speech when I was 5, before I was allowed to watch any
non-PBS TV. It was remarkably effective; I just tuned out all the commercials,
because I knew they were people trying to sell me things that I didn't
actually want before I saw the commercial. It got so extreme, at one point,
that my mom had to go the other way and say "Y'know, it's okay to spend money
once in a while."

~~~
ponderatul
I will take your advice to the heart. It really speaks for the quality of the
community here, to speak about marketing and advertising and its deplorable
influence on the young developing mind.

And I say that because I have been there. I have been anxious, unhappy because
of material posessions, wanting everything that is displayed vividly in
glamorous ads.

And it is a bad place to be. I'm 22 years old and now I'm cured. It's been
quite a journey to regain independent thought.

------
rokhayakebe
Random thoughts on the subject

"Happiness" and "Confidence" are two of the most dangerous words in American
Culture. I really wonder who benefits from this.

On Culture

Until the age of 19, I was in Western Africa. In our language there is no
direct substitute for the question "Are you happy?" I can ask "are you sick,
hungry, lost, fast, slow, smart, bad, good, angry,etc..," but I have no easy
straight way of asking "Are you happy?"

That is not to say people are happy, that is just to say the words/questions
shape the culture.

On Material Deprivation

On the other hand I noticed the difference between my status and my friends. I
had friends I would not bring to my home as a kid; these kids would spend on
clothes what was our family's monthly income. Material deprivation is entirely
subjective nevertheless. I also had cousins, family friends, who found our
home the best place to be during their holidays. They would usually live in
more remotes part of the country or in the suburbs, not the main city.

On Material Deprivation

"Appearance starts where performance ends." I notice the times one finds hope
or purpose bigger than themselves (even if temporarily) they do not care so
much about appearance. Take the average startup entrepreneur. They could live
in a shack and be content if they were confident they had the next Facebook in
hand. On the other hand they could land a job at Google for $250k yearly and
be miserable because their goal was to build a unicorn. To this end whenever I
worry about appearances, I know internally something is lacking. Something
deeper. It happens on and off, I realize it.

"Ignorance is really bliss"

I have noticed something: philosophers and analytical minds seem unhappy,
religious minds seem just accepting, and those who "do not appear" very
intelligent are having a freaking good time in life.

~~~
Dewie3
> I have noticed something: philosophers and analytical minds seem unhappy,
> religious minds seem just accepting, and those who "do not appear" very
> intelligent are having a freaking good time in life.

Which begs the question: who _really_ are the smart ones? :-)

Smarter people might have a tendency, more than others, to brood and worry
over existential questions and matters that happen to be depressing. But
worrying about things that are out of their small hands isn't exactly
productive, or smart.

~~~
rokhayakebe
_But worrying about things that are out of their small hands isn 't exactly
productive_

Or it may seem, but I believe the reason we make advances in almost every
field is due to philosophy. "Philosophy proposes and Science creates a
framework for discovering answers."

But I agree, it begs the question "who is really smart?"

~~~
Dewie3
There is a difference between philosophy in general and thinking and pondering
over nihilistic thoughts about existence itself that make you depressed.
"There is no point to life, and that makes me deeply sad. I can't do anything
about it since I am just an infinitesimal speck of dust in a vast universe,
but I intend to take this train of thought to the point of alcoholism and
despair nonetheless". That kind of thing.

The guy from True Detective comes to mind.

~~~
rokhayakebe
I agree with that. Both types of thinking lead to unhappiness with the
difference that one attempts to find answers while the other does not.

------
markyc
Almost half of Romania is still rural, so growing up is awesome (farms,
animals, free range everything)

Adults don't have it that easy in the country side

------
dasil003
So many confounding factors. Culture and social pressures pay a large part in
how happy adults will claim to be.

------
robhack
Well I can definitely count as being happy as a children, and quite often
depressed as an adult. But material deprivation doesn't explain that, at all.
As a child/teenager I could be happy just playing around (outside/legos/video
games). Now I'm just like "what's the point?" or generally getting bored
really fast about pretty much anything and just wondering about the
meaninglessness of life.

~~~
jostylr
My view is that kids are exploring and loving the world. Adults are support
mechanisms for kids (and elderly). But we have been stripped of community and
if you happen to not have kids, you can be even more isolated. Being around
(free) kids is a great way to feel meaning in life.

Adults are driven by our evolution to be useful to the community. Games are
designed to allow humans (particularly kids) to master skills. Adults ideally
should have already mastered much of the needed skills. Hence games cease to
be interesting the more one gets older (in general -- there are always plenty
of exceptions).

~~~
mhurron
For your insinuation that adults can only be happy if they have children, you
can kindly go fuck yourself.

~~~
jostylr
I said around children, not having children. The two are completely disjoint.
I know lots of people who have children but are not actually around them and
are miserable. Conversely, I know people without children who are surrounded
by the happy little critters and have a deep sense of fulfillment.

Being around children teaches you a compassion for others and yourself,
something your comment points towards a desperate need for.

------
thatcat
Since the last part of the brain to mature is the prefrontal cortex which
involves planning; perhaps adolescents simply can't imagine long enough into
the future to under stand why they might want so much money and stuff, whereas
an adult would be considering retirement and worrying about longterm
stability.

------
known
It sounds like
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_mobility](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_mobility)
versus
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_mobility](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_mobility)

------
randyrand
I wonder how children emotions were in the early 1800s, then. I wonder how it
affects things.

------
Dewie3
I've long wondered about whether adults really aren't wiser than children.
Smarter, yes, but the _wisdom_ might be largely a blob of limiting and
pessimistic beliefs. And a very _fragmented_ wisdom: adults argue and wage
wars over the right ways to live. And if we aren't condemning others for their
lifestyles and views on life, it might be because we are too busy trying to
find our own purpose and path.

Does it really take a lifetime to gain _wisdom_ about life? Or is it adults
that unlearn the wisdom of childhood, and forever after that struggle to find
_wisdom_ in an adult paradigm which is fundamentally flawed?

~~~
alexashka
Sounds like you're asking abstract questions instead of concrete ones. The
concrete questions will have concrete answers and you can go from there.

With abstract questions, you can sit around wondering for eternity. Unless you
come to recognize that you're not getting anywhere (life will remind you soon
enough) and do something concrete instead :)

If you replace wisdom with 'competence' it becomes much more down to earth.
When somebody else is feeding, clothing, scheduling, teaching etc and all you
have to do is use your base instincts, it's easy to be competent, you don't
need to do anything.

When you have to feed, clothe, schedule, teach etc yourself AND others AND
then some, it can be quite a challenge.

Children are not competent at much of anything, so there you go :)

~~~
Dewie3
Abstract questions are great when you don't quite know what to hone in on, so
that you don't get prematurely bogged down in specifics. Specifics which might
be superflouous to your question, or maybe even misleading. They are also
great when you want to have a general conversation with a general crowd, where
more broad and general questions and topics can facilitate more discussion
with several people, whereas more concrete, opinionated and assumptious
questions would only attract a few others if anyone. As for myself, my own
suspicions and enquires are a bit more focused and opinionated than you might
get the impression of here.

As for asking more concrete questions in this place, I see little point. At
least as far as your benefit is concerned since you know everything on this
topic already.

