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It's no secret that Nordic countries have very high levels of well-being.

Ever since the World Happiness Report launched their famous country happiness rankings back in 2012,

Scandinavian countries have consistently dominated the competition.

In fact, Finland and Denmark have claimed the top spots for an impressive seven years running.

The U.S. and UK, by contrast, they haven't even broken into the top ten.

So what's behind this Nordic happiness advantage?

Journalist Helen Russell believes it starts in childhood.

It's not an accident that people from the Nordic countries have voted the happiest in the world year after year.

This is how they are raised.

If you're a fan of the Happiness Lab, you might remember Helen from a previous episode,

entitled Move to Your Happy Place. I asked Helen to return for this special series on parenting

because she has traveled a rather circuitous path towards a happier family life.

So I am London, born and bred, and my husband got a job at Lego in Denmark,

and we had no intention of ever leaving London,

but Denmark kept being voted the happiest country in the world.

And I kind of wondered what was it all about?

Could it be that beer, bacon, Danish pastries really made you that happy?

So I decided I would give it a year,

investigating the Danish

happiness phenomenon firsthand, looking at different areas of Danish living to see if any of them

made me happier. And spoiler alert, it sort of did. And I ended up staying not one year, but nearly

...