Choices Which Change Life Satisfaction: Similar Results for Australia, Britain and Germany

• Published in: Social indicators research 2013-07, Vol.112 (3), p.725-748
• Main Authors: Headey, Bruce, Muffels, Ruud, Wagner, Gert G.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adults; Agreeableness; Attitude Change; Australia; Behavior Theories; Changes; Choices; Chronic illnesses; Community participation; Comparative Analysis; Conscientiousness; Cross Cultural Studies; Cultures and civilizations; Economics; England; Extroversion; Federal Republic of Germany; Foreign Countries; Germany; Happiness; Health Behavior; Hours of work; Human Geography; Inferences; Interpersonal Relationship; Life Satisfaction; Life Style; Life styles; Lifestyle; Lifestyles. Everyday life; Long term; Measurement; Microeconomics; Panel data; Panel surveys; Personality; Personality psychology; Personality Studies; Personality traits; Preferences; Psychometrics; Public Health; Quality of Life; Quality of Life Research; Regression analysis; Research Problems; Social Indicators; Social Influences; Social Life; Social research; Social Sciences; Socioeconomic Influences; Socioeconomics; Sociology; Sociometric Techniques; Statistical Analysis; Studies; Surveys; Unemployment; United Kingdom; Values; Well Being; Wellbeing; Working Hours
• ISSN: 0303-8300; 1573-0921
• DOI: 10.1007/s11205-012-0079-8

Using data from national socio-economic panel surveys in Australia, Britain and Germany, this paper analyzes the effects of individual preferences and choices on subjective well-being (SWB). It is shown that, in all three countries, preferences and choices relating to life goals/values, partner's personality, hours of work, social participation and healthy lifestyle have substantial and similar effects on life satisfaction. The results have negative implications for a widely accepted theory of SWB, set-point theory. This theory holds that adult SWB is stable in the medium and long term, although temporary fluctuations occur due to life events. Set-point theory has come under increasing criticism in recent years, primarily due to unmistakable evidence in the German Socio-Economic Panel that, during the last 25 years, over a third of the population has recorded substantial and apparently permanent changes in life satisfaction (Fujita and Diener in J Pers Soc Psychol 88:158–64, 2005; Headey in Soc Indic Res 85:389–403, 2008a; Headey et al. in Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 107(42):17922–17926, 2010). It is becoming clear that the main challenge now for SWB researchers is to develop new explanations which can account for medium and long term change, and not merely stability in SWB. Set-point theory is limited precisely because it is purely a theory of stability. The paper is based on specially constructed panel survey files in which data are divided into multi-year periods in order to facilitate analysis of medium and long term change.