If you want to be truly happy, then you need to find your life partner, right?

Wrong!

Despite the long running stigma that single people are miserable, research is showing that single people are experiencing happy and healthier lives than their married counterparts.

Don’t believe me?

Then go ahead and check out these 10 science-backed reasons.

1) Single people are more social

Research has found that Americans who are single are more likely to support and stay in touch with their family and socialize with others.

So while couples remain trapped in the bubble of their own love, single people are out there participating in their community and staying close to loved ones.

Humans beings are social animals, and psychologists have theorized that people who live alone naturally compensate by becoming more socially active than those who live with others.

2) Single people have more time to themselves

If you’re an introvert, this is particularly relevant to you.

Time alone is important for “restorative solitude”, according to psychologists.

Restorative solitude allows us to regain our energy, check in with our feelings and understand our own meaning and purpose.

This is not to say that some couples don’t make time for solitude, but it can be more difficult when you have a family, or you have social obligations to attend to for two people.

3) Single people have more time for leisure

Research suggests that single people spend an average of 5.56 hours a day on overall leisure activities, compared to married people, who spend an average of 4.87 hours a day on leisure.

This leaves more time for single people to engage in sports, exercise, recreation, TV, games and leisurely computer use.

Fairly obvious to point out, but who doesn’t want that?

Leisurely activities are a great way to reduce stress and find added meaning in life, which leads us to our next point…

4) Single people report experiencing more personal growth

In a study of 1,000 single people and 3,000 married people, single people reported higher levels of learning, positive change and growth.

Single people were also more likely to believe that new experiences were important to challenge how they think about the world and themselves.

It seems intuitive that single people are more likely to focus on bettering themselves, as they have one less person to worry about.

5) Single people have fewer legal liabilities

As LearnVest has reported, marrying someone makes you legally responsible for their financial missteps, whether that means assuming equal responsibility for their debt or becoming part of lawsuits filed against them.

Of course, if you’re going to go the distance and marry someone, you’d think you’d know everything about them and trust them completely, but this kind of thing has happened to others before.

6) Single people tend to have less credit card debt

Debt.com reported that single people are less likely to have credit card debt than married people.

Why?

Because married couples are more likely to have a family and a home. Children and property don’t come cheap.

7) Single women tend to earn higher salaries

As sexist as this is, a recent study found that women see bigger salaries when they’re single compared to their married counterparts.

The reason why was not reported. Perhaps it’s because single women are more ambitious as they have to fend for themselves.

Or more pessimistically, perhaps it because men in positions of power are making these decisions.

Let’s hope not.

8) Single men tend to work fewer hours than married men

The same study highlighted above found that single men between 28-30 work 441 fewer hours outside the home per year than do their married peers, while men between 44 and 46 work 403 fewer hours if they are single.

Again, kids and property don’t come cheap.

9) Single people tend to exercise more

Researchers from the University of Maryland found that men and women the ages of 18 and 64 who had never been married tend to exercise a lot more than their divorced or married counterparts.

It’s also been reported that married men were 25% more likely to be overweight or obese compared to single men.

As mentioned above, single people are more likely to have greater leisure time, leaving more time to exercise.

However, this doesn’t explain why divorced people don’t exercise as much. Perhaps routine has something to do with it?

10) Single people tend to sleep better

We can all agree that getting a good night’s sleep is pretty important.

And according to a survey, single people tend to get the most sleep – an average of 7.13 hours a night – compared to people in relationships, whether they are married or not.

The reasons for this are fairly clear. When you have someone next to you, it can be harder sometimes to get to sleep and stay asleep.

If you’re wondering whether you’ll be single forever, check out our latest article sharing the 9 telltale signs.

11) You can decide when and where to do things

When you are in a relationship, suddenly every decision you make has to include or at least consider the other person.

Being in a relationship means that you don’t make decisions on your own and if you do, it’s likley that your relationship isn’t going to last long anyway.

There is an unspoken assumption in relationships that decisions are to be made together and if you prefer to do this kind of thing on your own, you’re probably better off staying single.

It’s a luxury that many couples don’t have and it’s okay to be happy about staying single so you can call the shots.

12) You can hang out with whomever you want

Relationships often put strains on friendships, new and old. If you are in a relationship, it’s unlikely that you could make new friends of the opposite sex.

While archaic at best, there are a lot of people out there who would prefer that women don’t have male friends and vice versa.

It’s just uncomfortable for a lot of people.

So if you prefer to choose the people you hang out with and when, you might consider a single life – at least until you find someone who can get on board with the fact that you are allowed to have any kind of friends you want.

13) You are focused on your things right now

Dating is a distance thought compared to the things you’ve got going on in your life. You are out there making it happen for yourself and wonder how anyone with goals and ambitions has time for a relationship.

Don’t feel guilty about wanting to focus on your own desires and goals. Nobody is going to bring them to life for you so they deserve all the attention you can give them.

14) You aren’t yourself when you are in a relationship

Some people don’t like who they become when in a relationship.

For whatever reason, if you’ve had to end a relationship because you don’t like the way you act or how co-dependent you become, you might consider singledom as your status.

People have a way of influencing us without our awareness and if you’ve found that you change when you are in a relationship and don’t like it, well you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.

15) You like new things and not routine

Relationships are all about routine. Even the most exotic of relationships eventually turn the dial down and falls into some kind of pattern.

Relationships become about the day-in-and-day-out of life and routine can stifle your sense of adventure and self.

If you’d prefer to keep things light and airy and not be suffocated with a routine, you might think about staying single.

And you can be perfectly happy living a nomad lifestyle or at least, one that doesn’t involve the same breakfast, lunch, and dinner routine for the rest of your life.

16) You don’t get upset when people aren’t available to you

If you’ve ever had a partner that you missed when they weren’t around, you might be on the verge of enjoying being single more than being in a relationship.

If your partner sends you a note saying that isn’t available for dinner and you could care less, you are either in a boring relationship, or you don’t need to be in that relationship at all.

You can have dinner by yourself and be perfectly happy about it.

17) You don’t want to be responsible for anyone’s happiness

When you have a partner there is an unwritten rule that you are responsible for making them happy.

While many people are starting to come around to the idea that they are not responsible for the happiness of others, there is still a great deal of pressure for couples to make each other happy.

If you’d prefer to not have to be someone’s go-to for happiness, stay single. You can be just as happy making yourself happy as you can making someone else happy.

Plus, focusing on yourself is less dramatic than trying to make someone else’s day better.

In conclusion

We live in a society that would prefer that we were attached to other human beings in relationships and adhering to the status quo.

But the trend these days is that people are staying single longer, and not choosing to be in relationships.

Yet, there is a lot of pressure to get hooked up with someone as soon as possible.

If you’ve tried being in a relationship and found it wasn’t for you, there’s no need to feel bad about that. You might just be better off single.