Analyzes show that unmarried people are up to 80 percent more likely to have depressive symptoms than married people.
Researchers have found that saying ‘yes’ appears to have a protective effect against depression, which affects around 16 percent of adults in Britain.
The risk of depression also appeared to be higher in men and in those with higher levels of education.
And the findings could help identify groups at higher risk for mental illness, experts say.
Researchers from Macau Polytechnic University analyzed data collected from questionnaires from more than 100,000 people in seven countries: the US, Britain, Mexico, Ireland, South Korea, China and Indonesia.
Researchers have found that saying ‘yes’ appears to have a protective effect against depression, which affects around 16 percent of adults in Britain (file image)
The risk of depression also appeared to be higher in men and in those with higher levels of education (file image)
Writing in the journal Nature Human Behavior, researchers said: ‘Depression represents a significant global public health problem, and marital status is recognized as a potential risk factor’ (file image)
Over a follow-up period of up to 18 years, they found that being unmarried was linked to a 79 percent higher risk of depressive symptoms compared to married people.
Divorced or divorced individuals had a 99 percent higher risk of depressive symptoms, while widowed individuals had a 64 percent higher risk.
Unmarried participants in Western countries – including Britain – had a higher risk of depression than their counterparts in Eastern countries, they found.
The scientists suggest that the lower rates of depressive symptoms among married couples may be due to better social support, being better off financially and couples having a positive influence on each other’s well-being.
Writing in the journal Nature Human Behavior, they said: ‘Depression is a significant global public health problem, and marital status is recognized as a potential risk factor.
‘Our analysis found that across all countries, unmarried individuals had a higher risk of depressive symptoms than their married counterparts.
‘This increased vulnerability mainly emerged among single, highly educated men in Western countries.’
They said that in certain countries, drinking alcohol and smoking worsened depressive symptoms in people who were single, widowed or divorced.
Despite the findings, experts have previously described the idea of marital bliss as “largely a myth” with “hardly any evidence” that tying the knot leads to a better life.
The scientists suggest that the lower rates of depressive symptoms among married couples could be due to better social support, being better off financially and couples having a positive influence on each other’s well-being (file image)
Over a follow-up period of up to 18 years, they found that being unmarried was associated with a 79 percent higher risk of depressive symptoms compared to married people (file image)
Scientists reviewed dozens of studies last year to examine the differences in suicide, loneliness, physical health and happiness between people who are married and those who are not.
They found that people who remain single tend to have “very similar outcomes” to those who said “yes.”
Psychologist Dr Bella DePaulo, who led the previous study, said: ‘It is widely believed that people who marry become happier and healthier than when they were single.
“In fact, this belief is so pervasive, and so rarely challenged, that it is more than a belief; it is more like a mythology or ideology. And like many myths, this one is not true.
‘Studies that follow the same people over many years of their lives find little evidence that people who marry become happier or healthier than before; There are even indications that people become slightly less healthy after getting married.’
She warned that single people can be stereotyped as “miserable, lonely and alone, selfish and self-centered, and as people who want nothing more than to be a couple.”