The relationship between measures of subjective and economic well-being: A new look

The objective of this research is to examine the importance of variable specification in using economic variable to explain the variance in individual's perceived (1) overall psychological, (2) economic, and (3) non-economic well-being. Results indicate that careful specification of economic variables improves the explained variance of perceived subjective well-being. Specification of dependent variable, life satisfaction, based on a domain-specific scale, proves superior to using the response to the global satisfaction question, “How do you feel about life as a whole?’ Economic variables prove significant in explaining both perceived economic and non-economic domains of life satisfaction. Although its overall effect on life satisfaction is negative, increased family size is found to enhance non-economic life satisfaction, while detracting from economic aspects of life satisfaction.     

On the Sunny Side of Life: Sunshine Effects on Life Satisfaction

This paper seeks to analyze the influence of the weather on a person’s self-reported life satisfaction. On a theoretical level, it is claimed that ‘nice’ weather can improve the affective well-being of a person. Given this, it is argued that affects can, in turn, have an impact on that person’s general assessment of his or her life. In particular, it is expected that people would report a higher life satisfaction on days with unambiguously ‘nice’ weather. Data from three German large-scale surveys are used to test empirically to what extent self-reported life satisfaction is determined by the weather. All in all, the results are mostly consistent with the initial hypothesis. In all three samples those respondents surveyed on days with exceptionally sunny weather reported a higher life satisfaction compared to respondents interviewed on days with ‘ordinary’ weather. In two out of three samples, this difference was statistically significant. Hence, the supposed sunshine effect on peoples’ life satisfaction does indeed exist. Implications of these findings are discussed in a conclusion.     

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.     

Is the Easy Life Always the Happiest? Examining the Association of Convenience and Well-Being in Taiwan

Social scientists have under-examined neighborhood stores and other “resources” and their relationships to community welfare and personal happiness. Because the presence of neighborhood conveniences may signify that a neighborhood caters to residents’ needs and smoothes out the hassles of their daily lives, it could be hypothesized that commercial amenities and services enhance individuals’ satisfaction with their neighborhoods, with their health, and even with their lives as a whole. This study used a national probability sample from Taiwan, a densely populated society in East Asia, to test if service-oriented commercial and religious enterprises in neighborhoods are associated with positive estimations of well-being by those who occupy these spaces. We empirically examine whether proximity to main roads, night markets and temples or proximity to smoky food stands and other shops that produce pungent products affects well-being. Our findings from multivariate analyses suggest that if nearby conveniences are conceived as annoyances, they tend to lower satisfaction with neighborhood, but they do not lower life satisfaction in general. In contrast, air quality, along with “peace and quietness” is reported by respondents to be key in enhancing general well-being. We discuss the policy implications in the concluding session.     

Subjective Well-Being and Life Satisfaction in the Kingdom of Tonga

This paper describes an initial attempt to assess the subjective well being of a sample of 227 Tongans via self-report. Using items adapted from the Subjective Well Being Inventory (SUBI; Nagpal and Sell, 1985; Sell and Nagpal, 1992), participants rated their level of overall life satisfaction along with their perceptions of well-beingin a number of other more specific life domains. Results indicated that mean ratings of global life satisfaction were generally positive. A factor analysis of the remaining domain-specific well-being items indicated that items loaded on to one of two factors dealing with overall positive or negative evaluations of these life areas. Importantly, these scale items stressed the importance of social and kin relations in contributing to overall well-being. In terms of demographic variables, mature respondents reported greater levels of overall life satisfaction and well-being as compared to youthful respondents. Implications and directions for future research are discussed.     

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.     

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.     

The Latent Profiles of Life Domain Importance and Satisfaction in a Quality of Life Scale

The present study aimed to use a latent profile analysis to distinguish between populations in terms of life domain importance and satisfaction profiles. Then, a multinomial logistic regression was used to determine how background variables (e.g., gender, living areas, and school levels) and self-perceived health predict each latent quality of life (QoL) profile. We also investigated how the latent groups of adolescents predicted negative and positive well-being indicators (e.g., problem behaviors and overall life satisfaction). The sample consisted of 720 Taiwanese secondary school students. Three latent groups were established as follows: “unimportant-unsatisfied,” “important-unsatisfied,” and “important-satisfied.” The results indicate the following: (a) boys were more likely to fall into the “unimportant-unsatisfied” group than were girls; (b) better health increased the likelihood of being in the “important-satisfied” group; (c) high school students were more likely to be in the “unimportant-unsatisfed” group than were middle school students; and (d) no relationship was found between latent groups and living areas. The function of importance rating was not present when evaluating the importance-satisfaction profiles and their relationship with problem behaviors and overall life satisfaction. The problems of the “unimportant-unsatisfied” profile among youth are discussed.     

Subjective Well-Being Structure: Confirmatory Factor Analysis in a Teachers’ Portuguese Sample

Authors consider that subjective well-being is a theoretical construct that includes three components: life satisfaction, positive affect and negative affect. Despite the numerous studies already conducted, divergences remain concerning how to conceptualize these components within a global structure of subjective well-being. This study aims to examine the dimensionality of the subjective well-being construct. A set of self-report questionnaires was used to assess life satisfaction, positive and negative affect in 397 teachers of primary and high schools. A model of a tripartite structure was tested using a confirmatory factor analysis. The results corroborate the premise that subjective well-being is a multidimensional construct that incorporates three components: life satisfaction, positive affect and negative affect. Our findings reinforce the viewpoint that these three components are moderately correlated and relatively independent and also strengthen the need for a complete SWB assessment that includes adequate measures of all three components.     

Is Psychological Well-Being Linked to the Consumption of Fruit and Vegetables?

Little is known about the influence of people’s diet on their psychological well-being. This study provides evidence of a link between the consumption of fruit and vegetables and high well-being. In cross-sectional data, happiness and mental health rise in an approximately dose–response way with the number of daily portions of fruit and vegetables. Well-being peaks at approximately 7 portions per day. We document this relationship in three data sets, covering approximately 80,000 randomly selected British individuals, and for seven measures of well-being (life satisfaction, WEMWBS mental well-being, GHQ mental disorders, self-reported health, happiness, nervousness, and feeling low). The pattern is robust to adjustment for a large number of other demographic, social and economic variables. Reverse causality and problems of confounding remain possible. We discuss the strengths and weaknesses of our analysis, how government policy-makers might wish to react to it, and what kinds of further research—especially randomized trials—would be valuable.     

Ageing in Society: European Perspectives on Gerontology (3rd Edition), edited by John Bond,Sheila Peace,Freya Dittman-Kohli,and Gerben Westerhof

This study explored the meaning of the experiences of community-dwelling postmenopausal women who were born and grew up in a Muslim country when drawing a picture about their lived experiences of urinary incontinence. Hermeneutic phenomenology underpinned the study’s interpretive research approach. In-depth, semistructured interviews were conducted in two sessions with nine postmenopausal women. The participants were asked to draw a picture about their lived experiences of urinary incontinence in a self-portrait. Three themes emerged to illuminate the meaning of urinary incontinence, including “disruption of normal functioning,” “self-imposed restrictions,” and “feeling of despair.” Discussion of these themes was presented, and practice and research implications were suggested.     

The Subjective Well-being Construct: A Test of its Convergent,Discriminant, and Factorial Validity

Using structural equation modeling, we found empirical support for the prevailing theory that subjective well-being consists of three domains: (1) cognitive evaluations of one’s life (i.e., life satisfaction or happiness); (2) positive affect; and (3) negative affect. Multiple indicators of satisfaction/happiness were shown to have strong convergent validity as well as discriminant validity from positive and negative affect. Positive and negative affect likewise exhibited discriminant validity from one another. At both the item and scale levels of analysis, we obtained an intercorrelated three-factor solution corresponding to the three proposed subjective well-being domains.     

Development of the Contentment with Life Assessment Scale (CLAS): Using Daily Life Experiences to Verify Levels of Self-Reported Life Satisfaction

On average, Anglo-Americans report that they are satisfied with their lives, but their global evaluations tend to deviate from their daily experiences (e.g., Oishi [2002, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 28(10), 1398–1406]). We explored the hypothesis that the average life satisfaction of Anglo-Americans is better characterized as neutral than satisfied. In Study 1 we developed the five-item Contentment with Life Assessment Scale (CLAS), which focuses on contentment, fulfillment and self-discrepancies. Normative data based on three general population samples demonstrated that the CLAS produces a close to normal distribution of scores, has excellent reliability, and is sensitive to differences in life conditions (e.g., income, marital status). In two daily diary studies we tested whether global life satisfaction measures corresponded to people’s daily subjective well-being. The CLAS was the best predictor among three self-report life satisfaction measures of daily escapist behaviors including television watching and alcohol consumption, and daily stress-related physical symptoms (Study 2). In Study 3, participants recorded their level of life satisfaction daily for two weeks. Average daily life satisfaction scores clustered close to the neutral rather than satisfied point of the measurement scale.     

The Relations Among Relatedness Needs,Subjective Well-Being,and Depression of Korean Elderly

The first part of the study examined what the relatedness needs Korean elderly have in close relationships (spouse, children, friends) are. The most salient needs were “love and care” for spouse and “contact and often meeting” for children and friends. The second part of the study assessed the relations among the difference between expectation and satisfaction of relatedness needs, subjective well-being, and depression of Korean elderly. Regression analyses showed that the difference between expectation and satisfaction of relatedness needs for spouse and children significantly predicted subjective well-being and depression. Finally, gender differences are discussed in terms of the patriarchal culture of Korean society.     

Validating the Portuguese Version of the Satisfaction With Life Scale in an Elderly Sample

Life satisfaction is referred to a cognitive, judgmental process (Diener et al. in J Pers Assess 49:71–75, 1985), in which person’s quality of life is globally assessed according to his/her chosen criteria (Shin and Johnson in Soc Indic res 5:475–492, 1978). Thus, life satisfaction is a conscious cognitive judgment, based on the comparison of one’s life with a self-imposed standard or set of standards, which lead to a global assessment of life (Pavot and Diener in Psychol Assess 5:164–172, 1993). Among the many scales developed to measure life satisfaction, the Satisfaction With Life Scale (SWLS, Diener et al. in J Pers Assess 49:71–75, 1985) is one of the global life satisfaction scales more often used in the research arena. It is composed of five items assessing global life satisfaction, using a Likert type response format. The aim of this paper is to validate the Portuguese version of the SWLS via confirmatory factor analysis, with a sample of 1,003 elderly from Angola. Reliability, factorial and criterial validity estimates are presented. Overall, the results shown that the scale had an adequate one-factor confirmatory solution, satisfying reliability indices, and adequate criterion-related validity when assessed in a sample of Angolan elderly. The discussion relates the results with existing literature and posits the contributions of the paper: firstly, it offers the researchers on life satisfaction in Portuguese-speaking contexts a brief, self-rated measure of satisfaction with life that has sound psychometric properties, validity, and reliability; secondly, it is the first confirmatory validation of the scale in Portuguese.     

Satisfaction and happiness in a rural northern resource community

Satisfaction and happiness with life as a whole are analyzed in terms of satisfaction with health, finances, family, job, friends, housing, area, recreation, religion, self-esteem, transportation and government services for males and females. Patterns of influential variables differ for males and females. The perceived gap between what one has and wants is a better predictor of satisfaction than the gap between what one has and thinks similar others have, and the gap between what one has and the best one has had in the past. Domain-to-satisfaction and happiness explanations are combined with gap theoretic explanations to reveal the psychological dynamics of judgments of satisfaction for males and females for the 12 domains and global well-being.     

Satisfied and dissatisfied South Africans: results from the General Household Survey in international comparison

Who are the satisfied South Africans 10 years into democracy? How do material factors contribute to their life satisfaction? These are the questions addressed in this paper. Earlier South African research has consistently found a close positive relationship between life satisfaction and material standards of living in the apartheid and post-apartheid era. Recently, a new source of information has become available to shed further light on the association between material and subjective well-being. In 2002, Statistics South Africa, the country’s official source of statistical information, agreed to ask South Africans participating in the General Household Survey whether they were satisfied or dissatisfied with life. The 2002 General Household Survey (n26’000) used a measure developed for the Euromodule that allows for international comparison. The wide-ranging information contained in South Africa’s official?household survey offers a unique opportunity to explore what makes for satisfied and dissatisfied South Africans in relation to their material living standards. Results indicate that the improved living standards afforded to many black South Africans under democracy are associated with increases in life satisfaction. Furthermore, habituation does not appear to have diluted the positive relationship between living standards and well-being. However, political factors continue to play an important role in shaping subjective well-being. In conclusion, it is argued that material gains might also have restored the pride and dignity denied to black South Africans in the past.     

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.     

Life Satisfaction Judgments and Item-Order Effects Across Cultures

We conducted two studies to investigate the item-order effect on life satisfaction judgments. In Study 1, Japanese and American participants completed various life-domain satisfaction items either before or after completing general life satisfaction items. American respondents weighed the best life domains more strongly than Japanese respondents, in particular when they answered domain satisfaction items before making life satisfaction judgments. Overall, Japanese tended to weigh the worst life domains more heavily when making life satisfaction judgments than Americans. We hypothesized that the Japanese patterns of life satisfaction judgments come from the chronic attention to others’ perspective. To examine this hypothesis in Study 2, Japanese participants were exposed to either the “other are not watching” or the “other are watching” manipulation. As expected, when Japanese participants were led to believe that “others are not watching,” they judged their overall life satisfaction based more heavily on the best life domains (like Americans in Study 1).     

Self-Esteem as Mediator and Moderator of the Relationship Between Social Support and Subjective Well-Being Among Chinese University Students

This study examined both the mediating and moderating effects of global self-esteem on the relationship between social support and subjective well-being among Chinese university students. Three hundred and ninety-one university students (260 males and 131 females) from two different Chinese universities completed the social support scale, the self-esteem scale and the subjective well-being scale. Hierarchical regression analysis showed that global self-esteem partially mediated the influence of social support on life satisfaction and positive affect, whereas it fully mediated the influence of social support on negative affect. Moreover, global self-esteem moderated the relationship between social support and life satisfaction, and positive affect, but not negative affect. When students reported a high level of global self-esteem, those with high social support reported higher scores in life satisfaction and positive affect than those with low social support. However, there were no differences in life satisfaction or positive affect between groups with high and low social support when global self-esteem was low. The significance and limitations of the results are discussed.