Beyond the U-Shape: Mapping the Functional Form Between Age and Life Satisfaction for 81 Countries Utilizing a Cluster Procedure

Abstract

Classifying and explaining the causal and functional relationship between age and life satisfaction, especially in an international context, is still a major open question in demographics and happiness-research. Especially the debate whether to include sociodemographic control variables in these models has received much attention and deserves more discussion. The current contribution takes a cross-country perspective and attempts to sort countries into larger clusters, depending on their specific functional form. Using cross-sectional data from 81 countries with more than 170,000 respondents, the analyses demonstrate that there exist three larger clusters which display distinct functional relations (linear decline, U-shape, decline with a stable old-age period). Sociodemographic controls are not introduced since the total causal effect is to be estimated. Furthermore, the contribution explains cluster membership exploratively using macro indicators. While it becomes clear that countries with a linear decline are usually less developed countries, differences between the other two clusters are much less obvious.

The Relationship Between Age and Happiness Varies by Income

“…3 The disagreements partly boil down to the question whether the effect of age should be estimated net of other (typically, socio-demographic) variables or not (Blanchflower & Oswald, 2009;Glenn, 2009). If we are interested in the total effect of age (Bittmann, 2021), the answer is 'no', because these socio-demographical are likely mediators rather than confounders of age (Bartram, 2021), as they cannot cause age (for a dissenting opinion, see Bezimeni, 2011). If we are interested only in the direct effect of age that is not exercised via the influence of health, education, occupation, marital status, and so on, then indeed we should filter out the influence of these variables to see how age affects the residual variation in happiness.…”

“…It turns out that the U-curve is easier to find once other predictors of happiness have been taken into account (Bartram, 2021;Bittmann, 2021;Blanchflower & Oswald, 2009;Frijters & Beatton, 2012;Kassenboehmer & Haisken-DeNew, 2012;Laaksonen, 2018). This implies that the decline in happiness until mid-age is not entirely due to deteriorating health, unfavorable life events, such as divorce or death of a partner.…”

“…But the existence of time and cohort effects might complicate finding the relationships in (repeated) cross-sectional data, and their interpretation. Moreover, scholars have argued for significant heterogeneity in the responsiveness of people's subjective well-being in different countries to the effects of age and income (Bittmann, 2021;Hayo & Seifert, 2003;Laaksonen, 2018). For example, inequality, as one measure of the national political and economic context, has been shown to be a significant moderator of the effect of income (Alesina et al, 2004).…”

“…At the same time, important critiques have been raised against the U-curve as well, arguing that the empirical evidence is weaker than it appears (Galambos et al, 2020) and that the U-curve appears only after inappropriate adjustments to the data have been made (Bartram, 2021;Glenn, 2009). While the variations in the shape of the relationship between age and happiness across different countries and time periods have been explored (Bittmann, 2021), how the relationship changes for people with different incomes is a question that has not received a lot of scientific attention (Hsieh, 2011). But, as it turns out, the relationship differs significantly for people at the bottom, in the middle, and at the top of the income ladder, going from a 'hockey stick'-a deep and almost linear decline with a small bounce back in old age-to the classic U-curve to a flat line for the very rich.…”

The Relationship between Age and Happiness Varies by Income

“…At the same time, important critiques have been raised against the U-curve as well, arguing that the empirical evidence is weaker than it appears (Galambos et al 2020) and that the U-curve appears only after inappropriate adjustments to the data have been made (Glenn 2009;Bartram 2020). While the variations in the shape of the relationship between age and happiness across different countries and time periods have been explored (Bittmann 2020), how the relationship changes for people with different incomes is a question that has not received a lot of scientific attention (Hsieh 2011). But, as it turns out, the relationship differs significantly for people at the bottom, in the middle, and at the top of the income ladder, going from a 'hockey stick' -a deep and almost linear decline with a small bounce back in old age -to the classic U-curve to a flat line for the very rich.…”