Were human beings happier and stress free few hundred years ago before all the technology?
Daily, constant, common worries and anxiety are reduced and have been replaced with different types of worry.
Looking at developed ｃountries...
1. Health and life expectancy are far better.
2. Access to clean water, safe food, and safe living conditions are better than ever.
3. Safe work environments are considered a human right.
Let's define stress as adverse emotional pressure or anxiety based on internal and external factors directly or indirectly within our own control.
A few hundred years ago, life expectancy was far lower than it is today, in developed and non-developed ｃountries. The thought of dying before one turns 40 can make anyone anxious.
Hospitals are less scary
In the 1700s, if you entered a hospital, your chances of leaving alive were slim. Even 50 years ago, people (in my family) worried about this. Today, it's more likely that you will survive. Much less to worry about today.
Infant Mortality is down
Additionally, children often died during birth or before reaching adulthood due to disease and common ailments. Childhood ailments like the chicken pox or a fever would occasionally take the life of a child. Today, in developed ｃountries, death during childbirth is considered an anomaly.
Our Daily Bread
Before technology 100 years ago, the majority of people were either close to starvation due to poverty or on a sustenance diet barely scraping by. People suffered from worry about feeding their children and themselves. My Grandmother, born 1901, told stories of people in constant worry about food. Today, obesity is common and it would be unusual to see anyone less than fed.
The threat of death and dying is more stressful than pressures from your smartphone.
Take these factors into consideration: we have less life threatening things to worry about today then people did a few hundred years ago. In other words, less stress from a leading form of stress.
How can you measure happiness?
Happier? Perhaps: people have more free-time and have access to more life necessities. True, at least in the USA, there are more people being treated for depression and anxiety, but that's largely caused by drug companies powerful marketing machine.
Also true, technology can make you feel stressed, but stressed to the point where you feel your life is threatened? I don't believe so.
If you could go back in time... would you?
I know I wouldn't want to: access to food, water, and heat in the winter were daily hardships for the common person. Getting a tooth pulled could mean dying. No thanks.
Article Source: https://www.quora.com/Were-human-beings-happier-and-stress-free-few-hundred-years-ago-before-all-the-technology
Image Source: http://mediad.publicbroadcasting.net/p/kplu/files/styles/medium/public/201409/Hooverville_Seattle_1934.jpg
VOCABULARY WORDS:
1. Anxious (adj.) ~ experiencing worry, unease, or nervousness, typically about an imminent event or something with an uncertain outcome
2. Anomaly (n.) ~ something that deviates from what is standard, normal, or expected
3. Scrape by (idiom) ~ to make one's way with difficulty : barely manage or succeed
4. Hardship (n.) ~ severe suffering or privation
QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION:
1. Please answer the question presented (the title of the article), then, explain your answer.
2. What do you think is the best thing about the life a few hundred years ago? How about the worst part?
3. If you could go back in time, would you? Discuss your answer.
