Survey Says Unhappy People Watch Nearly 30 Percent More Television Than Happy People

In a report released Thursday, unhappy people watch almost 30% more television than happy people. The finding comes from a survey of nearly 30,000 American adults conducted between 1975 and 2006 as part of the General Social Survey.

While happy people reported watching an average of 19 hours of television per week, unhappy people reported 25 hours a week. The results held even after taking into account education, income, age and marital status. In addition, happy individuals were more socially active, attended more religious services, voted more and read a newspaper more often than their less-chipper counterparts. The researchers are not sure, though, whether unhappiness leads to more television-watching or more viewing leads to unhappiness

"TV is not judgmental nor difficult, so people with few social skills or resources for other activities can engage in it," said researcher John Robinson, a sociologist at the University of Maryland, College Park.

Robinson and UM colleague Steven Martin wrote of their research for the December issue of the journal Social Indicators Research.

They add, "Furthermore, chronic unhappiness can be socially and personally debilitating and can interfere with work and most social and personal activities, but even the unhappiest people can click a remote and be passively entertained by a TV." MORE>>

Believe it or not, there are a certain number of perfectly happy folks out there who live without television. See this story on www.LiveScience.com.

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