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Happiness Quotient Zanjan Tops the List

Happiness Quotient Zanjan Tops the List
Happiness Quotient Zanjan Tops the List

Happiness is important to people both as individuals as well as members of the larger society, primarily because eventually, the quality of life is entirely determined by emotions.

Aristotle described happiness as “the highest good.” A genuinely happy society will imbibe positive changes in all aspects of life.

Research on happiness and well-being worldwide has grown quite extensively.  A growing body of studies is demonstrating that as people become happier, they become better human beings, more compassionate, more creative, more energetic, more financially successful, more emotionally and physically healthy, and so on.  For those who are more concerned with creating a “better” world rather than a happier world, showing positive emotions may prove effective to this end.

A recent study led by Dr. Ali Montazeri, a faculty member of Iranian Academic Center for Education, Culture and Research,  was conducted to explore happiness levels in different provinces of the country, reports ISNA.

The study was conducted on 27,883 Iranians – at least 800 people from each province – aged 18-65 where the participants were asked to describe themselves as either ‘very happy’, ‘happy’, ‘moderately happy’, ‘not so happy’, or ‘barely happy’.

The findings revealed that 39.3% of people are moderately happy, while 35.4% described themselves not so happy, and only 3% said they were very happy.

Zanjan was introduced as the happiest among the 31 provinces with a score of 3.69 on a scale of one to five, and Yazd with a score of 3.12 was ranked the least happy followed by Khorasan Razavi and Kermanshah.

Golestan, Bushehr, Hormozgan and Kordestan all had people, happier than the average score.

 Decline With Age

The study also found that happiness levels decrease with age contrary to the global trend where stress levels generally dwindle as happiness levels increase over the long term.

Divorced people as well as married ones were 1.7 and 1.11 times less happy than single people respectively.

The study also linked higher education levels with more happiness. Homemakers, employed people, and unemployed people are 1.39, 1.32, and 1.40 times less happy compared to school or university students respectively.

Income and health were other factors influencing people’s levels of happiness by a considerable margin. The more financially well-off and healthier people are, the happier they describe themselves to be. However, chronic diseases do not affect happiness in any significant way.

Personality, self-esteem, religious beliefs, social wealth, leisure activities, weekly workout, history of neurological disease, and optimism were among indicators used to carry out the study.

Financialtribune.com