This feels like the ‘capital in the 21st century’ for individuals. Vaillant (and all the study leaders before and after him) have followed a small group of people over more than 70 years to search for long term predictions about thriving into old age. The conclusions of the book are not at all surprising, the keys to a happy and meaningful life into old age are:
- Loving relationships
- Developing mature coping habits
- Having a ‘warm’ childhood
OK - no news there. More interesting to me was the methodology by which the study reaches these conclusions, and all the hypotheses discarded along the way. The authors created a ‘decathlon of thriving’ spanning physical activity, health, relationships, mental well-being etc. all of which I found to be a useful framework for attempting to scientifically describe ’the good life’.
Also useful was the many hypotheses that have been discarded along the way. Most importantly, the study presents ample evidence to disprove that ’there are no second acts in American lives.’ Original hypotheses from the 30’s around things such as body type have since been descarded. Also money correlates with happiness only slightly, bad experiences in childhood do not doom people to failure, rather happy experiences in childhood predispose people to success.
Highly recommended reading.
hat tip to Alex Schultz for the recommendation!