Are Facebook users happier single or in relationships?

Facebook regularly analyzes the status updates of users to gauge their happiness. For Valentine’s Day they also factored in relationship status:

…people who are in a relationship or marriage do seem to be happier than everyone else. People who are in a relationship seem less happy compared to married folks, but there is less variation in both positivity and negativity amongst married people. Married people, however, tend to be older, and we know from other studies that people do become happier as they age.

There are also some surprises. Being in an open relationship seems to be a real bummer, and positivity amongst people with that status is even lower than people who list themselves as being widowed or “it’s complicated” (and FAR worse than being single!). Widowed people, on the other hand, show less emotion overall, either positive or negative.

Men are less happy in open relationships than women, which makes sense considering that 40% more women report themselves to be in an open relationship than men. Guys are more positive than girls when in a relationship or married, but they are more negative when married or engaged.

What is also interesting is that people who do not disclose their relationship status are about 50% more negative than everyone else.