As a teenager I remember asking my parents if it was possible to have a mid-life crisis before you left high school. This was followed by hearty chuckles. Nonetheless, it forces one to ask the question: what exactly is a mid-life crisis and how would you know if you were having one? And is there evidence that such a thing even exists? And if so, what are the symptoms? Does mid-life put you at risk of divorce, dying in a motorcycle accident, or failing to open your parachute?
There are many ways to answer these questions. And there are a number of dominant factors (and preconceptions) that appear in our middle years. There is a wealth of studies out there, including data from the Center for Disease Control (CDC) in the US, recorded between 1999 and 2010.
The upside
Divorce: Divorce does not increase in middle age. The National Center for Family and Marriage Research at Bowling Green State University found a steady decline in divorce rates across the adult lifespan. This is a typical pattern in other types of data as well. Peak divorce rates occur around the age of 20, with between 30 and 45 divorces per 1000 married couples per year. By the late forties and early fifties, this goes down to about 15 divorces per 1000 married couples, and it continues to decline from there. One of the biggest risk factors for divorce is having already had one - so avoid that, where possible.
Behind the wheel: People might be more likely to buy expensive and fast cars, but then again people in mid-life make more money than they did when they were younger. So perhaps a better indicator would be whether or not we saw a rise in fatal car accidents. The answer appears to be no; crash rates and fatal car accidents are at their lowest among people in their 40s and 50s. Accident rates rise again when people are in their 70s, but the majority of these accidents happen between one and 20 miles per hour. It’s a different kind of joy ride.
Homicide: Does middle age increase the chances that people will become homicidal killers? No. Starting from a peak homicide rate around the 20s, people grow increasingly meek as they get older. This is best known from the research of Wilson and Daly who studied homicide rates in Detroit, among other places. The principle results were that young, unmarried males were the primary offenders. The middle-aged, on the other hand, seemed to have their inner demons fairly well under control.
The downside
Depression: Mid-life can indeed be truly depressing. A number of studies on happiness have consistently found that happiness across the lifespan is a U-shaped function. People are saddest when they’re about middle age, and they tend to be happier when they are younger or older. It appears this has nothing to do with being human. New research led by Alexander Weiss at the University of Edinburgh also found this U-shaped pattern in great apes.
Suicide: You might be more likely to kill yourself in middle age. Studies on suicide across the lifespan indicate a small but possible rise in suicide rates as people age, though I’ve heard few claim a rise in mid-life. However, the CDC data tells a different story, with two clear peaks: one in people in their 80s and another nearly as high in the late 40s and early 50s, with about 17 suicides per 100,000 people. That’s about 10 more suicides per 100,000 people than occur in the late teens.
Also, though suicide rates are pretty much always higher for males, both males and females show this mid-life peak.
Taking chances: There has been some recent suspicion that middle-aged men may take more risks, highlighted by a recent article in The Times. With that in mind, I looked at data from the CDC on drowning and motorcycle accident rates. Not counting drowning and motorcycle accidents in individuals over 70 or under five, there are two telling peaks across the male adult lifespan: one in the late-teens and early twenties and a second smaller peak in the mid-forties.
This second peak represents an additional death toll of about 10 people per million in the age class. It’s certainly nothing near the size of the mid-life suicide peak. On the not unlikely chance that suicide victims and adventure-seekers are two sides of a complicated coin, one is forced to wonder when happiness is worth the risk.
In sum, there does appear to be a mid-life signal among the noise, though it doesn’t stand out as a hotbed of risk taking. It might leave some people a little more down than up. But these people should feel some solace in knowing that things do indeed get better.
For middle-age men feeling the call of youth, my recommendation is to wear a helmet and a life-vest at all times.
This article was originally published at Statistical Life.