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On the trail of the gold standard for subjective well-being

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Abstract

The absence of a ‘gold standard’ for subjective well-being has severely hampered the interpretation of data from empirical studies. This paper demonstrates a remarkable consistency among the results of 16 studies that have investigated ‘life satisfaction’ among large samples drawn from the general population. It is concluded that a population standard for ‘life satisfaction’ can be expressed as 75.0±2.5 percent of the measurement scale maximum score.

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  1. School of Psychology, Deakin University, 3125, Victoria, Australia

    Robert A. Cummins

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Cummins, R.A. On the trail of the gold standard for subjective well-being. Soc Indic Res 35, 179–200 (1995). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01079026

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