Measuring subjective wellbeing

A. Subjective wellbeing concerns people’s self-reported wellbeing (e.g. life satisfaction, happiness, psychological wellbeing). Survey questions of this nature aim to measure how people think and feel about their wellbeing rather than relying on more traditional objective indicators such as the level of educational achievement, employment, crime or material wellbeing. Indeed, human perception is fundamental to the definition of wellbeing and it can be argued that the only person who really knows whether a person is feeling well is the experiencing self (Layard, 2005). Survey questions that ask people to evaluate their own wellbeing allow for individual differences in terms of values and identity to be expressed. Although one person may answer a life satisfaction question by placing significant emphasis on their salary and job security, another may answer the same question by placing significant emphasis on their family relationships and health. This means that such measures capture what people think and feel rather than focussing on observable phenomena that sometimes have little bearing on peoples’ wellbeing.

B. Objective measures of wellbeing often fail to tap into what people think or feel, so have to assume certain observable factors influence wellbeing in certain ways. Generally speaking, objective measures focus on either objective-list or preference-satisfaction accounts, with a view to either improving objective circumstances such as health and education (Sen, 1999) or increasing the choices people have by raising average incomes (Harsanyi, 1982). Although objective measures of wellbeing are crucial, they cannot tell the whole story and the array of indicators currently available (e.g. numeracy, literacy and crime rates) sometimes complicates the picture, with many observable factors acting as proxies for what really matters.

C. The main advantage of asking people to assess their own wellbeing is that paternalism (prescriptive questions that assume certain things are good or bad for wellbeing) can be avoided and people’s thoughts and feelings are placed at the centre of policy. Although objective measures tend to correlate well with subjective wellbeing (Di Telia & MacCulloch, 2007; Oswald, 1997), they generally only account for a small proportion of one’s life satisfaction or happiness (Galloway et al, 2005) Scottish Executive, 2005). Measures of subjective wellbeing, however, are seen by many as getting to the heart of the issue (Layard, 2005).

D. Although Victorian social policy emphasised the importance of promoting mental health, the rise of behaviourism in the 1950s heavily influenced disciplines such as Psychology and Economics and encouraged the measurement of what is observable (behaviour) to the exclusion of what is unobservable (the mind). By and large, UK social and economic policy since the Great War has focussed predominantly on improving the economy and meeting the material needs of the population. Mental health and psychological needs have been conceived as harder to measure, unreliable and within an individual’s own responsibility. Objective measures of wellbeing have been favoured for some time because they’re easier to measure and observable through behaviour.

E. Nonetheless, an encouraging literature is now emerging suggesting that subjective wellbeing is a valid construct that can be reliably measured. Much recent research indicates that measures of subjective wellbeing tend to correlate well with other people’s views, behavioural data, brain activity and objective characteristics such as unemployment (see Layard 2005 for a useful review). Crucially, the last 10 years have seen a number of government and non-government reports begin to unpick how the UK could generate meaningful data of this nature. Political momentum has also gathered pace alongside the abundance of research now regularly published in fields as diverse as behavioural economics, psychology, neuroscience and philosophy.

F. Strong arguments are developing suggesting that now is a good time to generate national data on subjective wellbeing. The idea is that these data can then be used by policy makers alongside other measures that go beyond GDP (Dolan & White, 2007; Michaelson, Abdallah, Steuer, Thompson & Marks, 2008). The well-cited ‘Eastertin Paradox’ demonstrates that UK levels of life satisfaction and happiness have not risen since the 1950s despite unprecedented economic growth, and although this research has been criticised for not taking into account the use of bounded measures to measure subjective wellbeing, it does suggest that much more than economic growth is required to elevate wellbeing.

G. Whether measured as an end to itself or as a means to an end, such subjective wellbeing data could be used to: a) monitor ‘the state of play’; b) inform new policy; c) promote public wellbeing; and evaluate the impact of new or existing policies on wellbeing. The evidence suggests that various social and economic factors affect self-reported wellbeing, so it should be possible to influence subjective wellbeing via policy. A growing body of research also suggests that high levels of subjective wellbeing are a partial cause of various positive life events and outcomes (Lyubomirsky, King, & Diener, 2005).

H. Interest in measuring subjective wellbeing has grown considerably over recent years in the UK. Indeed, a number of major social surveys in the UK already include subjective wellbeing questions, and it seems that various policy areas could make use of these data. The question therefore is not whether to measure subjective wellbeing, but how to do this from now on. The balance between exploiting data that already exist and generating new data needs to be explored further, based on whether unmet user requirements exist.