Throughout the first 3 chapters, the authors addressed several characteristics and activities that have shown to increase the longevity of life. However, the specific number of years an individual’s lives, does correlate directly with whether their life was happy and healthy. The authors addressed this issue by saying that most people who live long, also live healthy lives, and that people who are dead are obviously “unhappy”. I thought this point about being dead as the worst case scenario was quite abrupt, and made me think whether or not their study took into consideration what the end of their patient’s lives looked like. For example, if an individual lived for a long time but spent many years suffering from illnesses, such as cancer or dementia, I would not consider that a healthy and happy life.
In addition, I could see some of the points they made about being sociable at play with my friends at school. The Terman study showed that more sociable people did not actually live longer than less sociable, or shy people, despite previous studies that state that sociable and outgoing people live longer. There are several factors taken into considering for why there is no difference between longevity and sociality. Having a social support system might increase longevity, but also sociable people are more likely to partake in risky behaviors. I see examples of this in my friend group, as the more outgoing and friendly people tend to partake in more risky behaviors, such as going out and drinking.