The Grant Study is part of the Study of Adult Development at

Harvard Medical School Harvard Medical School (HMS) is the graduate medical school of Harvard University and is located in the Longwood Medical Area of Boston, Massachusetts. Founded in 1782, HMS is one of the oldest medical schools in the United States and is cons ...

. It is a 75-year longitudinal study that followed 268 Harvard educated men, the majority of whom were members of the undergraduate classes of 1942, 1943 and 1944. It has run in tandem with a study called " The Glueck Study," which included a second cohort of 456 disadvantaged non-delinquent inner-city youths who grew up in Boston neighborhoods between 1940 and 1945. The subjects were all male and of American nationality. The men continue to be studied to this day. The men were evaluated at least every two years by questionnaires, information from their physicians, and in many cases by personal interviews. Information was gathered about their mental and physical health, career enjoyment, retirement experience and marital quality. The goal of the study was to identify predictors of healthy aging. The study, its methodology and results are described in three books by a principal investigator in the study, George Vaillant. The first book describes the study up to a time when the men were 47 years of age, and the second book to when the inner-city men were 70 years old and the Harvard group were eighty. In 2012, Vaillant and

Harvard University Press Harvard University Press (HUP) is a publishing house established on January 13, 1913, as a division of Harvard University, and focused on academic publishing. It is a member of the Association of American University Presses. After the retir ...

published ''Triumphs of Experience'', sharing more findings from the Grant Study. The study is part of The Study of Adult Development, which is now under the direction of Dr. Robert J. Waldinger at

Massachusetts General Hospital Massachusetts General Hospital (Mass General or MGH) is the original and largest teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School located in the West End neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts. It is the third oldest general hospital in the United Sta ...

. The study is unique partly because of the long time span of the cohort, and also partly because of the high social status of some of the study participants. Among the most notable Grant Study participants included

Ben Bradlee Benjamin Crowninshield Bradlee (, 1921 – , 2014) was an American journalist who served as managing editor, then as executive editor of ''The Washington Post'', from 1965 to 1991. He became a public figure when the ''Post'' joined ''The New Y ...

, an editor of ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...

'', and US President John F. Kennedy.

Main results

George Vaillant, who directed the study for more than three decades, has published a summation of the key insights the study has yielded: *

Alcoholism Alcoholism is, broadly, any drinking of alcohol that results in significant mental or physical health problems. Because there is disagreement on the definition of the word ''alcoholism'', it is not a recognized diagnostic entity. Predomin ...

is a disorder of great destructive power. ** Alcoholism was the main cause of divorce between the Grant Study men and their wives. ** Strongly correlates with neurosis and depression, which tended to follow alcohol abuse, rather than precede it. ** Together with associated cigarette smoking, was the single greatest contributor to their early morbidity and death. * Financial success depends on warmth of relationships and, above a certain level, not on intelligence. ** Those who scored highest on measurements of "warm relationships" earned an average of $141,000 a year more at their peak salaries (usually between ages 55 and 60). ** No significant difference in maximum income earned by men with IQs in the 110–115 range and men with IQs higher than 150. * Political mindedness correlates with intimacy: Aging liberals have more sex. ** The most-conservative men ceased sexual relations at an average age of 68. ** The most-liberal men had active sex lives into their 80s. * The warmth of childhood relationship with mothers matters long into adulthood: ** Men who had "warm" childhood relationships with their mothers earned an average of $87,000 more a year than men whose mothers were uncaring. ** Men who had poor childhood relationships with their mothers were much more likely to develop dementia when old. ** Late in their professional lives, the men's boyhood relationships with their mothers—but not with their fathers—were associated with effectiveness at work. ** The warmth of childhood relationships with mothers had no significant bearing on "life satisfaction" at 75. * The warmth of childhood relationship with fathers correlated with: ** Lower rates of adult anxiety. ** Greater enjoyment of vacations. ** Increased "life satisfaction" at age 75. According to ''

The Atlantic ''The Atlantic'' is an American magazine and multi-platform publisher. It features articles in the fields of politics, foreign affairs, business and the economy, culture and the arts, technology, and science. It was founded in 1857 in Boston, ...

'', George Vaillant's main conclusion is that the warmth of relationships throughout life has the greatest positive impact on life satisfaction. Put differently, Vaillant says the study shows: "Happiness is love. Full stop."

References

{{Reflist

External links

Article about the study
in ''

''
Robert Waldinger's TED Talk
discussing the study's findings Harvard University American medical research Psychiatric research Cohort studies