Featured Research

What makes for happy teenagers?

27 June 2018

This article was originally published in November 2017.

UQ Researcher Tony Beatton, along with Paul Frijters, has published new research on the changes in happiness among teenagers, in the Life Course Centre’s Working Paper series.

Using their own child-specific scales, they measured the effects of personality and life satisfaction on the happiness of Australian children aged 9–14. Using a method that integrated the collection of data with the children’s normal school program, where the 389 children were first exposed to the ideas of happiness by viewing a university research display, they sought to reduce the issues that often present when studying either children and or abstract concepts, such as happiness.

Their results showed that a steep decline of happiness occurred before the age of 14, which adds to previous Australian findings that happiness declines between the ages of 15 to 23. They found that school and friendship interactions explain more than 40 per cent of the decline, and that it is steepest when children are transitioning from their first to second year in high school.

They also found that perceived relative wealth does not contribute to childhood happiness, which is contrary to results found in adults. When children are extraverted they are often happier, as are conscientious children. While this finding surprised the researchers, they suggest this could be due to the fact that conscientious qualities are often rewarded in school environments.

You can read the full paper “Determinants of Adolescent Happiness in Australia”, here.