Are women becoming unhappier?

What to make of studies suggesting that "women are getting gloomier" despite greater opportunities

Women everywhere are feeling blue, said Maureen Dowd in The New York Times. According to the General Social Survey, which has tracked the mood of Americans since 1972, and five other major studies around the world, "women are getting gloomier and men are getting happier." Women felt exhilarated when in the early ’70s they were "breaking out of the domestic cocoon," but apparently all the new choices this made possible created a lot more stress.

It's not just American women, said Arianna Huffington in The Huffington Post. "Women around the world are in a funk." And this comes after four decades of women securing "greater opportunity, greater achievement, greater influence, and more money." The decline in "our collective state of mind seems to defy logic."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up