Are people less happy or more happy the older they get? If you answered more happy, then you were right, based on a study published two years ago. It found that people generally become happier and experience less worry after age fifty. In fact, it found that by the age of eighty-five, people are happier with their life than they were at eighteen.
The findings came from a Gallup survey of more than three hundred forty thousand adults in the United States in 2008. At that time, the people were between the ages of eighteen and eighty-five.
Arthur Stone in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science at Stony Brook University in New York led the study. His team found that levels of stress were highest among adults between the ages of 22 and 25. Stress levels dropped sharply after people reached their fifties.
Happiness was highest among the youngest adults and those in their early seventies. But the people least likely to report negative emotions were those in their seventies and eighties.
The survey also found that men and women have similar emotional patterns as they grow older. However, women at all ages reported more sadness, stress and worry than men did.
The researchers also considered possible influence like having young children, being unemployed or being single. But they found that influences like these did not affect the levels of happiness and well-being related to age.
So why would happiness increase with age? One theory is that, as people get older, they become more thankful for all that they have and have better control of their emotions. They also spend less time thinking about bad experiences.
Happiness is not the only thing that apparently improves with age. In a study published this year, people in their eighties reported the fewest problems with the quality of their sleep.
Researchers surveyed more than 150,000 American adults. The study, led by Michael Grander at the University of Pennsylvania, appeared in the journal Sleep.
The original goal was to confirm the popular belief that aging is connected with increased sleep problems. The survey did find an increase during middle age, especially in women. But except for that, people reported that they felt their sleep quality improved as they got older.

Title	The older you get, the ________ you are!
_____ of a Gallup survey	People are happier with their life when they are at 85 than they are at 18. Happiness is highest among the youngest adults and those in their early seventies. People in their seventies and eighties are ______ likely to report negative emotions. Men and women have similar emotional patterns as they grow older, ____ that women always report more sadness, stress and worry.
______ for this phenomenon	People become more thankful for _____ they have. People can ____ their emotions better. People spend less time thinking about bad experiences.
Effects of aging _____ sleep	On the one hand, sleep problems _____ during middle age. On the other ____, sleep quality improves as people get older.