There's no shortage of books about how parents affect their children's lives, but what about vice versa? That's what New York Magazine contributing editor and mother Jennifer Senior sets out to investigate in All Joy and No Fun, a book about parental well-being.
"We assume that children will improve our happiness," Senior tells NPR's Melissa Block. "That's why babies are called bundles of joy. But what's so interesting is that one of the most robust findings in the social sciences — and it's been this way for about 50 years — is that children do not improve their parents' happiness."
Senior scoured decades of data about parental happiness and says that the numbers are pretty discouraging. Children either have a net effect of zero, or they "slightly compromise their parents' happiness" she says. But what about that "bundle of joy"?
In All Joy and No Fun, Senior attempts to untangle "the paradox of modern parenthood." The title, she says, "was a casual aside uttered by a friend of mine. He was a new father, and when asked what he thought of the gig, [he said it] was: 'All joy and no fun.'"