Quality of Life as a Social Representation in China: A Qualitative Study |
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Authors: | Li Liu |
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Institution: | (1) School of Psychology, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, 100875, China |
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Abstract: | This study explores the meaning of quality of life (QOL) in China from the perspective of social representations. The data
were collected by open-ended individual interviews with 16 ordinary Chinese people. The study shows that social thinking about
QOL in Chinese society is activated in five critical domains of life: health, family, work, social relations and the natural
environment. Meanwhile, “having” and “being”, the two antinomic, yet dialogical interdependent, interpretive repertoires,
have an overarching generative and normative power over the discourse about QOL. They permeate and underpin the different
domains of life. Dominated by an “economic logic”, the “having” repertoire constructs these life domains through a set of
economic consequences and posits them as resources leading to material possessions. While dominated by an “existential logic”,
the “being” repertoire confesses existential meanings to the same life domains, and emphasises the joy derived from them.
Thereby, it infers that QOL as a social representation is generated from, and organised around, a central thema of “having”
and “being”. |
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Keywords: | Chinese society “ having” and “ being” quality of life social representation thema |
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