The perceived quality of life in Norway: Regional variations and contextual effects

This article deals with perceived quality of life and its relationship to sociodemographic background variables in Norway. We try to answer two questions, viz (1) to what extent does the absolute level of quality of life as well as the relationships between quality of life and individual-level sociodemographic variables vary between Norwegian counties? and (2) are such variations related to specific characteristics of the various counties? Some between-county variation is found, but in most cases the pattern of variation is not replicated across surveys. For variation in the absolute level of QOL as well as in the relationship between an individual's education and QOL, however, there is a moderate degree of stability. Contextual analyses show that the relationship between education and QOL is positive and moderately strong in affluent counties, near zero or negative in economically more backward areas. The results are interpreted within the framework of a person-environment fit model.