Deakin University national index of well being

Discussion on the results of Deakin University National index of well being.

Well-being achievement in Pacific Asia

The world has undergone rapid and tremendous change in recent decades. While many nations have achieved ever-higher per capita incomes, and higher well-being according to traditional measures, they have also experienced profound internal change. This change has lead to widespread concerns regarding social exclusion, human security, levels of personal satisfaction and happiness. Other countries have faired much less well, as according to many well-being measures they are worse off than they were 10 or 20 years ago. Life expectancies, for example, have fallen dramatically in many countries and are likely to fall substantially in others. The incidence of income poverty is higher today in many countries than it was ten years ago. Worldwide, more than a billion people currently live on less than one dollar per day. Social science research on living standards, human well-being and quality of life has come a long way over recent years, altering in response to changing global conditions, new research priorities, new conceptualisations and improved data resources. Twenty five years ago, national well-being achievement comparisons relied very heavily, and in some circles exclusively, on measures of income per capita. The same exercise would today be based a range of indicators, including summary measures of human well-being such as the well-known Human Development Index (UNDP, 2005). This is consistent with the commonly accepted view that human well-being is best treated as a multidimensional concept along the lines advocated by Sen (1985, 1993), Stewart (1985), Doyal & Gough (1991), Ramsay (1992), Cummins (1996), Narayan et al. (2000) or Nussbaum (2000) and others, as summarised in Alkire (2002). This view tends not to reject the relevance of income based or economic measures per se, simply positing that there is more to well-being achievement than simply increasing incomes. The widespread acceptance that well-being is multidimensional has more recently been accompanied by another important recognition. This relates not so much to current levels of well-being, but to the likelihood of declines in future levels. This recognition has spawned a rapidly growing literature on what is now termed as ‘vulnerability’. The vulnerability literature has primarily been concerned with the likelihood of individuals falling below the poverty line, be it defined in terms of income, consumption or health. Among the influential early vulnerability studies are Ravallion (1998), Jalan & Ravallion (1998) and Dercon & Krishnan (1999), each of which distinguished between transient and chronic poverty.

Subjective well-being of Beijing taxi drivers

This study investigates subjective well-being among a sample of Beijing taxi drivers in the lead up to the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games using the Personal Wellbeing Index (PWI). The specific aims of this study are (a) investigate the psychometric properties of the PWI in this unique population; (b) ascertain whether Beijing taxi drivers are satisfied with their lives; and (c) examine whether the responses to the PWI from participants falls within the narrow range predicted by the 'Theory of Subjective Wellbeing Homeostasis'. The PWI demonstrated good psychometric properties and was consistent with previous studies for Western and non-Western samples. The data revealed a moderate level of subjective well-being (PWI score = 61.1). While Beijing taxi drivers work long hours for low wages, the PWI was nonetheless within the normative range predicted for Chinese societies by the 'Theory of Subjective Wellbeing Homeostasis'. The results suggest that the homeostatic mechanism is fairly resilient, even when the individual leads relatively a hard life based on objective indicators. Specifically, for Beijing taxi drivers, it appears that external, buffers such as personal relationships and feeling part of the community, act to assist the homeostatic system. © 2009 Springer Science+Business Media B.V.

Ecosystems and human well-being

■ Human well-being has several key components: the basic material needs for a good life, freedom and choice, health, good social relations, and personal security. Well-being exists on a continuum with poverty, which has been defined as"pronounced deprivation in well-being."
■ How well-being and ill-being, or poverty, are expressed and experienced is context- and situation-dependent, reflecting local social and personal factors such as geography, ecology, age, gender,and culture.These concepts are complex and value-laden.
■ Ecosystems are essential for human well-being through their provisioning, regulating, cultural, and supporting services. Evidence in recent decades of escalating human impacts. on ecological systems worldwide raises concerns about the consequences of ecosystem changes for human well-being.
■ Human well-being can be enhanced through sustainable human interaction with ecosystems with the support of appropriate instruments, institutions, organizations, and technology. creation of these through participation and transparency may contribute to people's freedoms and choices and to increased economic, social,and ecological security.
■ Some believe that the problems from the depletion and degradation of ecological capital can be largely overcome by the substitution of physical and human capital. Others believe that there are more significant limits to such substitutions.The scope for substitutions varies by socioeconomic status.
■ We identify direct and indirect pathways between ecosystem change and human well-being,whether it be positive or negative.lndirect effects are characterized by more complex webs of causation, involving social, economic, and political threads. Threshold points exist beyond which rapid changes to human well-being can occur.
■ Indigent poorly resourced, and otherwise disadvantaged communities are generally the most vulnerable to adverse ecosystem change. Spirals, both positive and negative, can occur for any population, but the poor are more vulnerable.      
■ Functioning institutions are vital to enable equitable access to ecosystem services. lnstitutions sometimes fail or remain undeveloped because of powerful individuals or groups. Bodies that mediate the distribution of goods and services may also be appropriated for the benefit of powerful minorities.
■ For poor people, the greatest gains in well-being will occur through more equitable and secure access to ecosystem services. In the long run, the rich can contribute greatly to human well-being by reducing their substantial impacts on ecosystems and by facilitating greater access to ecosystem services by the poor.
■ We argue ecological security warrants recognition as a sixth freedom of equal weight with participative freedom, economic   facilities, social opportunities, transparency guarantees, and protective security.

Geographical dislocation and adjustment in university students: the impact of attachment, autonomy and coping behaviour on stress and well-being

The relative contribution of geographical dislocation, attachment styles, coping behaviours, and autonomy, to successful student adjustment, was examined in relation to stress and well-being. A sample of 142 on campus first year university students, across four Victorian university campuses completed self-report questionnaires. Questionnaires included demographic, social network, intrapsychic (attachment and autonomy), and coping variables. Multiple regression analysis revealed that being female, not having made a friend to confide in personal matters, lower achieved autonomy, and use of emotion-focused coping predicted higher levels of student stress. A second multiple regression analysis revealed that living away from home, and preferring others to approach oneself to initiate conversation or friendships predicted lower well-being, whilst increased frequency of phone and email contact, and greater secure parent and peer attachment, predicted greater well-being. Pearson's correlations indicated that securely attached students used more problem focused coping and social support, whereas insecurely attached students used more emotion focused coping. Qualitative data indicated student concerns about being away from family and friends, finance, course direction and structure, social opportunities on campus, and generally adjusting to the university culture. It was concluded that first year on-campus students would benefit from program initiatives targeting enhancement of on-campus social opportunities, development of autonomy, problem focused coping behaviour, interpersonal and social assertiveness.

Electronic media use and adolescent health and well-being : cross-sectional community study

Objective : To describe time adolescents spend using electronic media (television, computer, video games, and telephone); and to examine associations between self-reported health/well-being and daily time spent using electronic media overall and each type of electronic media.

Methods : Design–Cross-sectional data from the third (2005) wave of the Health of Young Victorians Study, an Australian school-based population study. Outcome Measures–Global health, health-related quality of life (HRQoL; KIDSCREEN), health status (Pediatric Quality of Life Inventory 4.0; PedsQL), depression/anxiety (Kessler-10), and behavior problems (Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire). Exposure Measures–Duration of electronic media use averaged over 1 to 4 days recalled with the Multimedia Activity Recall for Children and Adolescents (MARCA) computerized time-use diary. Analysis–Linear and logistic regression; adjusted for demographic variables and body mass index z score.

Results : A total of 925 adolescents (mean ± standard deviation age, 16.1 ± 1.2 years) spent, on average, 3 hours 16 minutes per day using electronic media (television, 128 minutes per day; video games, 35; computers, 19; telephone, 13). High overall electronic media use was associated with poorer behavior, health status, and HRQoL. Associations with duration of specific media exposures were mixed; there was a favorable association between computer use (typing/Internet) and psychological distress, whereas high video game use was associated with poorer health status, HRQoL, global health, and depression/anxiety. Television and telephone durations were not associated with any outcome measure.

Conclusions : Despite television's associations with obesity, time spent in other forms of media use appear more strongly related to adolescent health and well-being. This study supports efforts to reduce high video game use and further exploration of the role of computers in health enhancement.

Controlling subjective well-being

This thesis focused on the impact of disordered eating and obesity, and found that people with better self-esteem and personal control experience greater satisfaction with their lives overall. Although people reporting disordered eating reported lower self-esteem and obese people were less satisfied with their health, overall life satisfaction was maintained. The portfolio examined the Scientist-Practitioner Model (S-P) of psychology whereby practitioners perform dual roles as clinician and researcher. The clinical utility of the S-P model was then evaluated in four case studies.

Non-economic well-being achievement in Pacific Asia

It is well known that income per capita and most widely reported non-economic well-being achievement measures are highly correlated among countries. Yet many countries exhibit higher achievement in the latter than predicted by the former. The reverse is true for many other countries. This paper commences by extracting the inter-country variation in a composite of three widely reported educational and health status indicators not accounted for by variations in income per capita. This extraction is interpreted inter alia as a measure of non-economic well-being. Using data for a sample of Pacific Asian countries, the paper then looks at correlations between this extraction and a number of new or less widely-used well-being measures, in an attempt to find the measure that best captures these achievements.

Fuzzy well-being in Pacific Asia

This paper develops a framework that uses fuzzy-set theory to measure human well-being. Fuzzy sets allow for gradual transition from one state to another while also allowing one to incorporate rules and goals, and hence are more appropriate for measuring outcomes that are ambiguous. Such ambiguity is an inherent characteristic of cross-country achieved well-being assessments. This framework is used to provide a fuzzy representation of the well known Human Development Index (HDI) and its three components. Fuzzy HDI estimates for 14 Pacific Asian countries are provided and compared with non-fuzzy estimates. Quite large differences in rankings emerge. The paper concludes by suggesting that fuzzy measures should be used more widely to measure achieved well-being outcomes.

Global inequality in well-being dimensions

This paper contributes to the literature on global inequality in multidimensional well-being by examining inter-country disparities in the longevity, knowledge and standard of material living components of the well-known and widely-used Human Development Index for the years 1992-2004. It differs from previous studies by examining global inequality in each of the components of this index alongside that of the index as a whole, thus side-stepping ambiguities over weighting that are inherent to multidimensional well-being indices. The Gini coefficient, both population and non-population weighted, is used to measure the extent of inequality. Results indicate that the different components often provide very different information to the index as a whole, especially with respect to changes in global inequality over time. Most component variables show declines in global inequality, whereas the longevity component exhibits increased inequality since 1992.

Three Australian community choirs : ageing, singing and well-being

The promotion of social engagement amongst older Australians is a national priority. Music is a powerful social mechanism that allows individuals and communities to affirm identity, gain a sense of belonging, and share history and culture. Community choir membership offers older people opportunities to connect with others and share a sense of purpose that can enhance their sense of well-being and potentially reduce their experience of social isolation. This paper explores the understandings of well-being, positive ageing and community music making held by members of three choirs in Victoria; Australia. The choirs selected for this discussion are the Coro Furlan, the Skylarkers and the Bosnian Behar Choir. Data have been collected via semi-structured interview with members of the three choirs and analyzed using interpretative Phenomenological Analysis which employs a phenomenological approach that explores personal experience in the participant's life-world. analysis of the combined data identified two broad common themes: First is the personal impact that choir membership has for the individual which includes the building of friendships and opportunities to learn and share music. The second theme concerns the contribution that the choir can make to others in their local community. Thus older singers are provided with a way to be both engaged, validated and appreciated by their contemporary society. Choir participation is an effective way for individuals to express themselves, engage with each other, improve their quality of life, transmit cultural heritage, and build community.