A Network of Friends Crucial for Happiness.

How many friends, not how much money, you have predicts how happy you are likely to be right after you retire. That is one of the findings from a University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, study suggesting that, as baby boomers age, they probably should pay as much attention to their social lives as their financial portfolios. Conducted by graduate student Alicia Tarnowski and psychologist Toni Antonucci, a senior researcher at the university's Institute for Social Research, it provides evidence that post-retirement changes in life satisfaction are common. It also finds that the size of a recently retired person's social support network, not the size of that person's wallet or state of physical health, is the strongest influence on whether life satisfaction changes for better or worse.

"Retirement is a major life transition," indicates Tarnowski, noting that, while some studies have found psychological well-being increases after retirement, others have found that it drops. In addition to investigating the effect of retirement on life satisfaction, the researchers wanted to learn why some people feel better about their lives after they retire, while others feel worse. Accordingly, they analyzed data on 100 people who all were employed when first interviewed, but had retired when re-interviewed four years later. Most of these recent retirees reported some change in life satisfaction, with 25% saying they were more satisfied and 34% less satisfied with their lives after retirement. The remaining 41% reported levels of life satisfaction about the same as when they were working.

The researchers analyzed how physical health; income; the number of negative life events, including divorce and death of a...