

PRINCETON — Becoming a parent may intensify the joy and stress in your life, but having children in your house doesn't necessarily make you happier, according to a new study.

Americans between the ages of 34 and 46 with children still living at home have higher "life satisfaction levels" than people without kids, researchers say.

But when you factor out higher education levels, higher incomes, better health and the influence of religion on those surveyed, the data shows parents and non-parents actually have the same happiness levels, according to a new study by Princeton University and Stony Brook University researchers published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

"It is simply a mistake to presume that because people deliberately want children and deliberately bring them into being that those people with children should have better lives," said Angus Deaton, a Princeton economics and international affairs professor. "Non-parents are not 'failed' parents, and parents are not 'failed' non-parents. Some people like oranges, and some like apples, and we do not think that orange eaters should have better or worse lives than apple eaters."

However, the researchers found being a parent heightened nearly all emotions, including happiness, smiling, enjoyment, worry, stress and anger. Only physical pain registered higher among non-parents than parents.

"Life evaluation is not the same as experienced emotions, such as happiness, enjoyment, sadness, worry or stress," Deaton said. "The results show that, no matter what else is taken into account, parents experience more of all of these than non-parents. There are good days and bad, ups and downs."

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