How Much Do Sources of Happiness Vary Across Countries? A Review of the Empirical Literature

Köln Z Soziol https://doi.org/10.1007/s11577-019-00612-y ABHANDLUNGEN How Much Do Sources of Happiness Vary Across Countries? A Review of the Empirical Literature Olga Stavrova © The Author(s) 2019 Abstract This article presents a review of empirical research exploring cross-national differences in the correlates of subjective well-being (SWB). I start by giving an overview of the concept of SWB across psychological, sociological, and economic literature. Measures of SWB have good cross-cultural validity, yet there is currently little consensus regarding the cultural universality of the definition of happiness. An overview of existing empirical literature points toward robust crossnational differences in mean levels of SWB that are associated with national differences in wealth and other socioeconomic, political, and cultural factors. The degree to which individual-level variables are associated with SWB is also subject to crossnational variations. Many individuals’ characteristics contribute to happiness to the extent that they are beneficial, socially desirable, and aspired to in a particular sociocultural context. These results are discussed in light of two theoretical approaches (institutional and fit hypotheses). Directions for future research are proposed. Keywords Life satisfaction · Cross-national comparitive research · Subjective well-being · Culture · Person-culture fit Internationale Unterschiede in den Einflussfaktoren auf das Glück: Übersicht über die empirische Literatur Zusammenfassung Dieser Artikel stellt eine Übersicht der empirischen Forschung über internationale Unterschiede in den Korrelaten des subjektiven Wohlbefindens (SWB) dar. Zuerst wird eine Übersicht der Konzeptualisierung und OperationalisieO. Stavrova () Department of Social Psychology, Tilburg University PO Box 90153, 5000 LE Tilburg, The Netherlands E-Mail: K O. Stavrova rung des Konzepts SWB in der psychologischen, soziologischen und ökonomischen Literatur gegeben. Obwohl es in der Glücksforschung keine Übereinstimmung über die interkulturelle Universalität der Definition von Glück gibt, ergaben die Messinstrumente von SWB eine gute interkulturelle Validität. Ein Überblick empirischer Studien zeigt robuste internationale Unterschiede in den Durchschnittswerten von SWB, die mit nationalen Unterschieden im Wohlstand und anderen sozioökonomischen, politischen und kulturellen Faktoren zusammenhängen. Der Zusammenhang zwischen Glück und individuellen Merkmalen unterliegt ebenfalls internationalen Unterschieden. Individuelle Faktoren tragen zum höheren SWB insofern bei, als sie in einem bestimmten soziokulturellen Kontext sozial erwünscht und angestrebt sind. Die Ergebnisse werden im Licht von 2 theoretischen Ansätzen (institutionelle Hypothese und Person-Umwelt-Passungstheorie) diskutiert. Es werden Vorschläge für zukünftige Forschung gemacht. Schlüsselwörter Lebenszufriedenheit · International-vergleichende Forschung · Subjektives Wohlbefinden · Kultur · Person-Umwelt-Passung 1 Introduction The question of the nature and causes of human happiness has been a source of major interest in philosophy since antiquity, with different schools of thought offering different answers (McMahon 2006). In contrast to philosophy, it is only since the middle of the twentieth century that social scientists have discovered this research field. Since then, research on happiness, or subjective well-being (SWB), as this concept is often referred to in the social sciences, has been very fruitful, and attracted scholars from diverse disciplines, including psychology, sociology, and economics, who have published more than 80,000 articles on that topic in total over the last 30 years (according to the Web of Science). Most of this work has been dedicated to revealing factors that contribute to a higher vs. a lower SWB. Some studies have focused on individual characteristics, such as personality traits, values, and beliefs or life circumstances. Others explored contextual or country-level predictors, such as cross-national differences in social policies, socioeconomic conditions and culture. Finally, a third group of studies combined the investigation of individual- and country-level factors exploring how they come together to affect individuals’ happiness. Studies exploring individuallevel predictors probably represent the largest portion of the literature and have been the target of several review papers in psychology (Diener et al. 1999; Lyubomirsky et al., 2005a, b). Studies exploring national-level predictors have been the major focus of sociological and economic literature on SWB and have also been reviewed before (Di Tella et al. 2003; Frey and Stutzer 2005). Yet, there have been no reviews of the third stream of empirical research, the one that combines the examination of individual- and country-level predictors of SWB. Therefore, the present review focuses on this third group of studies. Nevertheless, to put these studies into context, I also include an overview of empirical studies that examined individual- and country-level predictors independently of each other. I will start by discussing existing K How Much Do Sources of Happiness Vary Across Countries? A Review of the Empirical... conceptualizations, definitions, and measurements of the concept of SWB, including the question of its cross-cultural validity (see also Cieciuch et al. 2019). I will then proceed to present an overview of empirical findings pertaining to individual- and country-level predictors, as well as their joint effects on SWB. Finally, I will discuss the results in the light of existing theories and outline directions for future research. 2 The Concept of Subjective Well-being Probably due to the interdisciplinary nature of SWB research (it is an active area of research across diverse disciplines, mainly including psychology, sociology, and economics), there are currently dozens of concepts that are studied under the umbrella term of subjective well-being: life satisfaction, avowed happiness (Wilson 1967), subjective happiness (Lyubomirsky and Lepper 1999), authentic happiness (Seligman 2002), affect balance (Bradburn 1969), experienced utility, and objective happiness (Kahneman 2000), to name but a few. Even though research on SWB is largely interdisciplinary in nature, it has long been dominated by psychologists. This is not surprising, as SWB is an individuallevel concept that deals with differences in individuals’ subjective perception and evaluation of reality; and the way people see reality is the core business of psychology, a science of the human mind. In contrast, despite the rising level of interest in the concept of happiness in sociology and economics, it is still rarely discussed in the respective textbooks and journals (Veenhoven 2008). This relative lack of interest has been explained by these disciplines’ main interest in understanding societal problems rooted in objective reality or conditions, rather (...truncated)