For years, women have been told that happiness arrives in a neat little package: marriage, children, a mortgage and perhaps a family calendar stuck to the fridge. Yet one behavioural science expert has challenged that familiar script. His argument is not that one life is better for everyone, but that freedom from family expectations may suit many women far more than society admits.
Why single women are being discussed differently
Paul Dolan, professor of behavioural science at the London School of Economics, has argued that unmarried women without children may be among the happiest and healthiest groups in the population.
Speaking at the Hay Festival in 2019, he said: ‘The healthiest and happiest population subgroup are women who never married or had children.’
It is the kind of sentence that makes people pause mid coffee. Not because it is impossible to believe, but because it goes against decades of social messaging. Women are still often asked about marriage and babies as though life were a checklist with only one correct order.
Dolan, author of Happiness by Design, based his comments on long term data tracking people over time. His view is that marriage tends to offer clearer benefits to men than to women.
The pressure around marriage and children
Dolan’s point is not that marriage is miserable or that motherhood is a mistake. Plenty of women find both deeply fulfilling. The issue is the pressure to pretend that everyone must want the same thing.
He has suggested that married men often benefit because they take fewer risks, earn more and may live longer. Women, he argues, may carry more of the emotional and practical weight within family life.
Anyone who has watched a woman remember the school trip form, the dentist appointment, the birthday present and what is in the freezer may recognise the problem. It is not always dramatic. Sometimes it is just exhausting.
This is where the conversation becomes useful. The World Health Organization defines health as more than simply the absence of illness, including mental and social wellbeing too. By that measure, personal freedom, emotional wellbeing and life satisfaction matter enormously.
Why this does not mean one answer fits all
Dolan has also acknowledged that having children can be ‘an amazing experience’ for some people. The difficulty, he says, is that society rarely leaves enough room for people to admit when it is not.
That honesty matters. A woman who chooses not to marry or have children is not necessarily lonely, selfish or waiting to be corrected by fate. She may be building a rich life full of friendships, work, travel, rest, creativity and quiet Sunday mornings. Honestly, the quiet Sunday mornings deserve their own applause.
Equally, a married mother may be perfectly happy. The real problem is not marriage or motherhood. It is the assumption that they are compulsory routes to fulfilment.
Rethinking what happiness looks like
The most helpful takeaway is not that single, childfree women have cracked the secret code of life. It is that happiness depends on fit, not formula.
For some, that means a partner and children. For others, it means independence, fewer domestic obligations and space to decide what a good life looks like.
Dolan’s comments may sound provocative, but they open the door to a calmer question: what if women were allowed to choose without being pitied, judged or rushed?
That would be progress. Because healthy choices, social expectations, independence and genuine happiness rarely look identical from one life to the next.
