Older people appear to be many times happier than their younger counterparts, Shari Roan writes in the Los Angeles Times. Life experience and emotional stability appear to be key factors: "One of the first researchers to discover that older people tend to be happier thinks there's another reason for this greater emotional control. It's linked to a person's sense of time. Older people are aware that life doesn't last forever -- and, with a finite amount of time, they think it should be well spent. In a study at Stanford University's Center on Longevity, psychologist Laura Carstensen showed that people who perceived their future time as limited had goals that were emotionally meaningful. People who perceived their futures as open-ended had goals that tended to be knowledge-related. Carstensen concluded that, as people age, they encounter 'shrinking time horizons.' With less time left, people tend to focus on the now."