Life Satisfaction and Income Comparison Effects in Turkey

This paper evaluates the relative impact of different types of benchmarks such as internal and external comparisons on subjective well-being in Turkey. There are few studies on life satisfaction for Turkey and they mostly focus on the impact of socio-demographic effects on subjective well-being. The main purpose of this paper is to investigate how reference group’s self-reported life satisfaction is related to the level of consumption; as well as the level of internal and external comparisons and other socio-economic factors. The paper relies on the Life in Transition Survey (EBRD 2011), a survey conducted in late 2010 jointly by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the World Bank. The survey includes 1,003 observations for Turkey. The emphasis of the paper is based on the concept of income comparisons—both to others in the relevant reference group and to oneself in the past (evaluation) and future (expectation). The main findings are; in addition to household consumption, internal and external comparisons have significant impact on life satisfaction. The impact of comparisons is asymmetric: in most cases under-performing one’s benchmark has a greater effect than out-performing it.     

Gender Differences in the Consequences of Divorce: A Study of Multiple Outcomes

In this study, I examined gender differences in the consequences of divorce by tracing annual change in 20 outcome measures covering four domains: economic, housing and domestic, health and well-being, and social. I used data from the German Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP) and fixed-effects panel regression models on a sample of N = 18,030 individuals initially observed in a marital union, N = 1,220 of whom divorced across the observation period (1984–2015). Three main findings emerged from the analysis. First, men were more vulnerable to short-term consequences of divorce for subjective measures of well-being, but postdivorce adaptation alleviated gender differences in these outcomes. Second, a medium-term view on multiple outcomes showed more similarity than differences between women and men. The medium-term consequences of divorce were similar in terms of subjective economic well-being; mental health, physical health, and psychological well-being; residential moves, homeownership, and satisfaction with housework; and chances of repartnering, social integration with friends and relatives, and feelings of loneliness. Third, the key domain in which large and persistent gender differences emerged were women’s disproportionate losses in household income and associated increases in their risk of poverty and single parenting. Taken together, these findings suggest that men’s disproportionate strain of divorce is transient, whereas women’s is chronic.     

Capabilities and Choices: Do They Make Sen’se for Understanding Objective and Subjective Well-Being? An Empirical Test of Sen’s Capability Framework on German and British Panel Data

In Sen’s Capability Approach (CA) well-being can be defined as the freedom of choice to achieve the things in life which one has reason to value most for his or her personal life. Capabilities are in Sen’s vocabulary therefore the real freedoms people have or the opportunities available to them. In this paper we examine the impact of capabilities alongside choices on well-being. There is a lot of theoretical work on Sen’s capability framework but still a lack of empirical research in measuring and testing his capability model especially in a dynamic perspective. The contribution of the paper is first to test Sen’s theoretical CA approach empirically using 25 years of German and 18 years of British data. Second, to examine to what extent the capability approach can explain long-term changes in well-being and third to view the impact on subjective as well as objective well-being in two clearly distinct welfare states. Three measures of well-being are constructed: life satisfaction for subjective well-being and relative income and employment security for objective well-being. We ran random and fixed effects GLS models. The findings strongly support Sen’s capabilities framework and provide evidence on the way capabilities, choices and constraints matter for objective and subjective well-being. Capabilities pertaining to human capital, trust, altruism and risk taking, and choices to family, work-leisure, lifestyle and social behaviour show to strongly affect long-term changes in subjective and objective well-being though in a different way largely depending on the type of well-being measure used.     

Models of well-being and ill-being

The purpose of this paper is to present models of well-being and ill-being which integrate the effects of different types of independent variables. Using the more powerful techniques provided by the LISREL software, the paper replicates and extends analysis previously reported in SIR (Headey, Holmstrom and Wearing, 1984a). A preliminary issue is whether well-being and ill-being constitute different dimensions or whether they are polar opposites. Factor analytic evidence, derived from two waves of an Australian panel study (1981, 1983) with samples of 942 and 878 respectively, confirms that indicators of well-being and ill-being form distinct, although not orthogonal dimensions. In the models of well-being and ill-being estimated from the panel data, we attempt to integrate research dealing with the impact of social background, personality, social networks and satisfaction with particular domains of life. Two key personality traits which influence both well-being and ill-being are self-esteem and personal competence. Social background (SES) has greater influence on ill-being than well-being. Having a well-developed social network, on the other hand, contributes more to enhancement of well-being than relief of ill-being. This is largely because a rich social network is associated with satisfaction with leisure, friends and marriage, which themselves are the life domains most closely connected to feelings of well-being. By contrast, the domain of health is relatively closely associated with ill-being. The conclusion discusses public policy implications of the finding that well-being and ill-being have different correlates and causes. Conventional welfare policies are designed to relieve ill-being. Quite different policies (“positive welfare” policies) are required to enhance well-being.     

The quality of life in Australia

This paper outlines a long term project on the quality of life in Australia and presents some initial survey data. The long term project is intended (1) to find which domains of life most affect the perceived well-being of Australians and the values/satisfactions people wish to achieve in these domains (2) to propose policy programs designed to enhance satisfaction with particular domains and (3) to assess the political feasibility of proposed programs. Policy programs intended to enhance satisfaction are termed positive welfare programs to distinguish them from conventional compensatory welfare programs. The survey data analysed here (national sample, N=679) deal with the satisfactions and dissatisfactions of Australians, the correlates of perceived well-being and the links between domains and values. Perceived well-being is measured by Andrews and Withey's Life-as-a-whole index and Bradburn's Affect Balance scale. Satisfactions are measured on a 9 point modified version of Andrews and Withey's delighted-terrible scale. Readers familiar with American, British and Canadian findings will find the results reported here broadly similar. However, the linkage between people's sociological characteristics and their satisfaction levels appears to be exceptionally weak in Australia, which tends to confirm the view that Australia is a comparatively unstratified society.     

They Are Richer But Are They Happier? Subjective Well-Being of Chinese Citizens Across the Reform Era

This study examined Chinese’s subjective well-being (SWB) in the past two decades. By capitalizing on the single time-series data available on SWB in China during the reform era (spanning for nearly two decades) and adopting a newly-developed cross-classified random effects model that can disentangle the confounding effects of age, period and birth cohorts, this analysis detects significant age and period effect. First, Chinese exhibits a curvilinear and concave relation between age and life satisfaction. Secondly, economic prosperity in the past decades did not translate into greater satisfaction with life among Chinese people. Significant period effect reveals a V-shape pattern of life satisfaction: the declining trend has continued throughout the 1990s and the beginning of the millennium. By 2007 (the most recently available), the life satisfaction of Chinese people has rebounded to some extent, albeit still considerably lower than in 1990. Subsequently, in search of explanations for this overall trend of plummeted subjective well-being among Chinese citizens over time, whether and how the rising inequality asserts its influence on SWB in China’s context are tested and discussed.     

Gender Differences in Happiness and Life Satisfaction Among Adolescents in Hong Kong: Relationships and Self-Concept

This study uses survey data from adolescents (N = 1,428) in Hong Kong to test the association of gender with happiness and life satisfaction through relationship style and self-concept. While self-esteem and purpose in life are associated with higher happiness and life satisfaction, having more close friends is related to higher happiness, but not necessarily life satisfaction. On the other hand, boys with higher academic achievement are happier, but not more satisfied; the opposite holds true for girls. Our results provide a much-needed investigation of the differential effect of gender on the subjective well-being of adolescents. Contributing to the theoretical debate about the concepts of subjective well-being, we argue that happiness and life satisfaction are empirically and conceptually distinct. Life satisfaction might be characterized by more profound enjoyment and achievement in life than happiness.     

Revisiting the Structure of Subjective Well-Being in Middle-Aged Adults

Subjective well-being is a broad, multifaceted construct comprising general satisfaction with life, satisfaction with life domains (health, family, people, free time, self, housing, work, and finances), positive affect, and negative affect. Drawing on representative data from middle-aged adults (N = 738), the authors used three different structural models to analyze the interrelationships among these facets of subjective well-being. In a top-down model, a single factor representing global subjective well-being explained the correlations found among the more specific facets of subjective well-being and exerted the strongest influence on general satisfaction with life, satisfaction with health, and satisfaction with finances. In a bottom-up model, satisfaction with the latter two domains had the strongest effect on global subjective well-being. The authors discuss the implications of their findings for research on subjective well-being.     

Work-Related Demands Emanating from Social Change and Their Relation to Trait-Like and Occasion-Specific Aspects of Subjective Well-Being

Following current macro-level social change people are increasingly confronted with new demands encompassing perceived uncertainties concerning their job and career prospects. Studies utilizing concurrent assessments showed that perceiving a high accumulation (“load”) of such demands is negatively related to individuals’ subjective well-being. Without further evidence the interpretation of the direction of these effects, however, is equivocal. Based on the concept that individuals have a rather stable trait-like level of subjective well-being from which they may vary when confronted with changes of the external ecology, the current study examined the relationship between the reported load of demands and subjective well-being assessed as general life satisfaction and average satisfaction in domains of life (i.e., family, work, finances, and leisure). We expected that a higher load of demands corresponds to a temporary decline in well-being, while at the same time differences in the stable trait-like level of well-being account for differences in the reported demand load. For the purpose of our study, we analyzed three annual waves of assessment of German adults aged between 18 and 43 years (N = 488). Utilizing a trait-state-occasion model, we separated trait-like aspects of well-being from occasion-specific deviations. Overall, our results confirmed our expectation that effects indeed run in both directions. The higher the reported load of work-related demands, the more respondents’ well-being negatively deviated from the stable trait-like level. Beyond that a higher trait-like level of well-being corresponded to a lower demand load. Both effects revealed almost equal strength and remained stable after controlling for participants’ employment status, family status, and educational attainment.     

Measuring Household Wealth with Latent Trait Modelling: An Application to Malawian DHS Data

Public perceptions of crime and victimisation can influence an individual’s subjective well-being. Research into the impact of the fear of crime and victimisation on subjective well-being, however, has been limited; particularly with respect to the relative contributions of real versus perceived crime towards an individual’s self-reported life satisfaction. Improving our understanding of the relationship between crime and well-being is important, as public resources assigned to reducing or controlling crime could be assigned to addressing other social concerns. This paper extends the literature by exploring the contribution of real and perceived crime in an individual’s local area to their self-reported life satisfaction. Our results indicate that: (1) individuals’ perceptions of crime in their local area are far greater than actual levels of crime; (2) the gap between perceived and real crime is widening as real crime rates fall faster than the perceived rate of crime; (3) real crime rates detract more from an individual’s self-reported life satisfaction than perceived rates of crime; however, (4) perceived rates of crime have an adverse impact on life satisfaction beyond those associated with real crime; and (5) there is significant heterogeneity in the life satisfaction effects of real and perceived crime among groups of individuals. These results, together with empirical evidence highlighting successful strategies for moderating perceptions of crime, facilitate the development of more informed public policy that will improve individual life satisfaction and, ultimately, community well-being.     

Does National Income Inequality Affect Individuals’ Quality of Life in Europe? Inequality,Happiness, Finances,and Health

This paper analyses the effect of income inequality on Europeans’ quality of life, specifically on their overall well-being (happiness, life satisfaction), on their financial quality of life (satisfaction with standard of living, affordability of goods and services, subjective poverty), and on their health (self-rated health, satisfaction with health). The simple bivariate correlations of inequality with overall well-being, financial quality of life, and health are negative. But this is misleading because of the confounding effect of a key omitted variable, national economic development (GDP per capita): Unequal societies are on average much poorer (r = 0.46) and so disadvantaged because of that. We analyse the multi-level European Quality of Life survey conducted in 2003 including national-level data on inequality (Gini coefficient) and economic development (GDP) and individual-level data on overall well-being, financial quality of life, and health. The individual cases are from representative samples of 28 European countries. Our variance-components multi-level models controlling for known individual-level predictors show that national per capita GDP increases subjective well-being, financial quality of life, and health. Net of that, the national level of inequality, as measured by the Gini coefficient, has no statistically significant effect, suggesting that income inequality does not reduce well-being, financial quality of life, or health in advanced societies. These result all imply that directing policies and resources towards inequality reduction is unlikely to benefit the general public in advanced societies.     

Living Arrangements and the Well-Being of Single Mothers in Japan

The goal of this study is to evaluate the extent to which the well-being of single mothers in Japan is related to coresidence with other adults. Using data from a representative survey of households headed by single mothers, we examine two measures of subjective well-being: perceived economic circumstances and self-rated health. One-fourth of the single mothers surveyed were coresiding with another adult(s) and it is clear that these women fare significantly better than their non-coresiding counterparts on both measures of well-being. Net of several theoretically relevant sociodemographic, family, and employment characteristics, single mothers living with others were significantly less likely to report somewhat difficult/difficult economic circumstances or fair/poor health. Efforts to account for potential endogeneity between well-being and living arrangements suggested that self-rated health, but not subjective economic well-being, is related to selection into coresidence. Single mothers in fair/poor health appear more likely to coreside with others and, accounting for this selection, intergenerational coresidence appears to be very beneficial for self-rated health. We discuss the implications of these findings for processes of stratification in Japan in light of the limited public income support available to single mothers.     

Immigrants’ Sense of Belonging to the Host Country: The Role of Life Satisfaction,Language Proficiency,and Religious Motives

This paper focuses on a significant concept in migration studies: immigrants’ sense of belonging to the host society. Drawing upon the literature of immigration and subjective well-being, we proposed a model in which life satisfaction is a major predictor of immigrants’ sense of belonging, and is explained by background variables including religious affiliation, religious motivation, native language proficiency and ethnic segregation. The study was based on a survey of two groups of highly skilled migrants in Israel; immigrants from France and the Former Soviet Union who moved to Israel in the last two decades. The findings suggest that, as expected, life satisfaction had a significant influence on immigrants’ sense of belonging and served as a mediator variable in the model. Whereas ethnic segregation was not found to be a significant parameter in the model, religious motivation and Hebrew language proficiency were found to be prominent. In light of the literature, we also discuss the importance of religious motivations to immigrants’ subjective well-being, identity, and sense of belonging.

     

Will boys’ mental health fare worse under a hotter climate in Australia?

A hotter climate is increasingly found to have negative effects on human health, yet the possible impact on children’s mental health is less understood. Our study explored this potential relationship using a national survey of children aged 6–11 across Australia, during the period 2008–2014 (n?=?14,096). It was hypothesised that the negative effects of hotter weather on children’s mental health can occur both directly (e.g. through heat impacts influencing hyperactivity and restlessness) and indirectly (e.g. through reduced participation in organised physical activities). Mediation analysis controlled for a range of other locational, gender, socio-economic and demographic influences. Results indicate that an increase in annual average daily maximum temperature worsened childhood mental health due to a direct and indirect effect through reduced participation in organised physical activities, as measured by the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) total score, but the result is only significant for boys (albeit the magnitude of the effect was small). More specifically, temperature differences are driven through the SDQ mental health sub-scales of hyperactivity and peer problems. Gender disparities are also observed in terms of other environmental or locational influences having a significant impact on boys’ mental health, with no significant impact found for girls. Girls’ mental health is more likely influenced by family and individual socio-economic characteristics. There is also evidence of an increased impact of higher temperature on children’s mental health in poorer households, suggesting the need for more targeted children’s mental health policies.     

Life Domain Satisfactions as Predictors of Overall Life Satisfaction Among Workers: Evidence from Chile

This article examines the subjective antecedents of life satisfaction of workers. Adopting a ‘bottom-up’ perspective, we assessed the unique influence that satisfaction with multiple life domains have on evaluative judgments of overall life satisfaction. Based on a nationwide sample of 530 Chilean workers, we simultaneously tested the effects of seven life domain satisfactions that have been consistently included in extant models of life satisfaction and subjective well-being. These were satisfaction with health, financial situation, social relationships, one’s self-worth, leisure-time, family, and work. Having controlled for age and gender, results showed that satisfaction with one’s financial situation was the dominant predictor of overall life satisfaction of workers, with a weight of .36. Satisfaction with family, work, and health had effects of .25, .14, and .14, respectively. Interestingly, satisfaction with one’s self-worth, leisure-time, and social relationships did not have statistically significant effects on life satisfaction, although the first two showed t values near the critical value.     

Probing Folk Happiness in Taiwan

This paper examines Taiwan’s folk happiness, which means the subjective well-being of the common people. Subjective well-being of people refers to the judgments people make about their life satisfaction or happiness. Such judgments may include their satisfaction of life as a whole (global life satisfaction) or of specific aspects of life (domain satisfaction). Based on survey data from a large sample, the life satisfaction of people is investigated in two aspects—people’s personal life and their perceived conditions of living in Taiwan, respectively presented as personal well-being and national well-being or societal well-being. The meanings of the well-being findings are interpreted against the socio-political environment of Taiwan. The paper also examines the socio-demographic aspects, including gender, age, marital status, education, income, religion of the folk happiness of Taiwan. It is found that people in Taiwan are moderately happy.     

Subjective Well-Being, Societal Condition and Social Policy – The Case Study of a Rich Chinese Society

The article looks at whether or not social policy and other societal-condition variables contribute to the subjective well-being of life satisfaction. It firstly argues that social policy needs to pay more attention to the study of subjective well-being. Then, it reviews the literature and finds that people in rich societies generally have higher levels of life satisfaction. But the findings of a social survey on the level of and variance in life satisfaction in a rich Chinese society reveal the contrary. The empirical data reflects a life satisfaction pattern along strong income and class lines. It also confirms that social policy and other societal-condition variables have different degrees of impact on life satisfaction. At last, implications of the findings for social policy are discussed.     

Quality of life in a European Perspective: The EUROMODULE as a New Instrument for Comparative Welfare Research

In this article, a new survey instrument for comparative welfare researchand social reporting is described, the EUROMODULE. It has been set up inintensive discussions among experts from several nations engaged inquality of life research and social reporting. By combining indicatorsof objective living conditions, subjective well-being, and quality ofsociety, with this new survey central aspects of the quality of life ofEuropean citizens can be investigated. The EUROMODULE initiative aimsat strengthening efforts to monitor and systematically analyze thecurrent state and the changes in living conditions and quality of lifein Europe in a comparative perspective. So far, data for eightEuropean countries are available.     

代际支持对老年人主观幸福感的影响--基于年龄组的差异性分析

本文从年龄组差异的角度分析了代际支持对老年人心理健康的影响。研究发现,在控制了客观健康状况等变量后,老年人的心理健康水平并非随着年龄增长呈现出下降趋势。其次,接受代际支持和给予代际支持都对老年人心理健康有着显著的促进作用。第三,对于不同年龄组来说,代际支持对老年人心理健康产生的效果既有共同点也存在着差异。相似之处在于充足的经济支持对65－74岁、75－84岁和85岁及以上这三个年龄组老人的心理健康都是有利的。然而,更突出的是这三个年龄组之间的相异点：对于65－74岁这一组别而言,老人与子女之间的经济交换最为频繁。这种经济上的互惠提升了老人的积极情绪、抑制了消极情绪的产生。就75－84岁的老年人来说,子女在日常照料的作用表现的十分显著。和子女共同居住、在生病时由子女照料的老人表现出更少的消极情绪。至于85岁以上的高龄老人,得到充足的情感支持对于提升主观幸福感的作用更为显著;最先和子女分享想法的老人有着更高的心理健康水平。因此就现实状况来看,当父母逐渐衰老,作为子女,应当更加关注对父母的日常照护和情感关怀。尤其是对于这些高龄老人,他们对子女的情感态度更为敏感;子女提供的充足的情感支持对其心理健康有着十分显著的促进作用。     

退休对男性老年人健康的影响--基于断点回归的实证研究

退休是个体从过去工作生涯中抽身出来的转折点，退休后个人福利的变化是老龄化社会值得关注的问题。基于中国家庭追踪调查（ CFPS）2012年数据，以男性为例采用模糊断点回归的方法识别退休对个体心理、生理健康的因果影响。结果显示，退休对个体的生理健康并没有显著影响，但对其心理健康有显著的正向效应。从影响渠道来看，退休后个体压力减少，认知功能、记忆力以及对生活满意程度提升是导致健康（尤其是心理健康）改善的主要原因。本文的研究为未来退休政策的制定提供参考。