Are you happier when you spend less time with people and more time working toward some type of goal? According to a study on happiness that was recently published in the British Journal of Psychology, that certainly seems to be the case for people who are more intelligent.
From a survey of 15,000 American adults ages 18 to 28, the researchers focused on just two social components that have always influenced human happiness: population density and how often they socialize with others. Through their research, they found that the more densely populated participants’ living circumstances were, the less satisfied they were with their lives. And the more frequently that participants’ interacted with close friends, the happier they were reported to be.
When intelligence was brought into the picture, the researchers discovered that the results were quite different. According to the Washington Post’s report on the study, population density affected participants of average intelligence more than twice as much as those of higher intelligence. But what’s perhaps even more interesting is that those who were more intelligent also reported less overall life satisfaction when they spent more time socializing.
