Volunteering and its relationship with personal and neighborhood well-being

Although a relationship between volunteering and well-being has been demonstrated in numerous studies, well-being has generally been poorly operationalized and often defined by the relative absence of pathology. In this study, the authors take a positive approach to defining well-being and investigate the relationship between volunteering and personal and neighborhood well-being. The theoretical approach incorporates elements of the homeostatic model of well-being. A sample of 1,289 adults across Australia completed a questionnaire that assessed personal and neighborhood wellbeing, personality factors, and the psychosocial resources implicated in the homeostatic model of well-being. Analyses reveal that volunteers had higher personal and neighborhood well-being than nonvolunteers and that volunteering contributed additional variance in well-being even after psychosocial and personality factors were accounted for. The findings are discussed in terms of previous research and the homeostatic model of well-being, and it is argued that the relationship between volunteering and well-being is robust.

Assessing the validity of impact pathways for child labour and well-being in social life cycle assessment

Background, aim and scope: Assuming that the goal of social life cycle assessment (SLCA) is to assess damage and benefits on its ‘area of protection’ (AoP) as accurately as possible, it follows that the impact pathways, describing the cause effect relationship between indicator and the AoP, should have a consistent theoretical foundation so the inventory results can be associated with a predictable damage or benefit to the AoP. This article uses two concrete examples from the work on SLCA to analyse to what extent this is the case in current practice. One considers whether indicators included in SLCA approaches can validly assess impacts on the well-being of the stakeholder, whereas the other example addresses whether the ‘incidence of child labour’ is a valid measure for impacts on the AoPs.

Materials and methods: The theoretical basis for the impact pathway between the relevant indicators and the AoPs is analysed drawing on research from relevant scientific fields.

Results:   The examples show a lack of valid impact pathways in both examples. The first example shows that depending on the definition of ‘well-being’, the assessment of impacts on well-being of the stakeholder cannot be performed exclusively with the type of indicators which are presently used in SLCA approaches. The second example shows that the mere fact that a child is working tells little about how this may damage or benefit the AoPs, implying that the normally used indicator; ‘incidence of child labour’ lacks validity in relation to predicting damage or benefit on the AoPs of SLCA.

Discussion: New indicators are proposed to mitigate the problem of invalid impact pathways. However, several problems arise relating to difficulties in getting data, the usability of the new indicators in management situations, and, in relation to example one, boundary setting issues.

Conclusions: The article shows that it is possible to assess the validity of the impact pathways in SLCA. It thereby point to the possibility of utilising the same framework that underpins the environmental LCA in this regard. It also shows that in relation to both of the specific examples investigated, the validity of the impact pathways may be improved by adopting other indicators, which does, however, come with a considerable ‘price’.

Recommendations and perspectives: It is argued that there is a need for analysing impact pathways of other impact categories often included in SLCA in order to establish indicators that better reflect actual damage or benefit to the AoPs.

The language of Well-Being

The language of Well-Being is a linguistic analysis of acute hospital patients not suffering depression. Despite patients' ill health, their language revealed a 'positive' attitude, particularly a capacity to be resilient, extroverted and optimistic. This thesis describes the language that 'works' for mentally healthy people in extremely challenging circumstances.

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.

Subjective well-being

This thesis challenges the orthodox view in the quality of life field by demonstrating, using different methodologies across multiple samples, that subjective judgments of life satisfaction are determined by an individual's affective style, rather than cognition or personality. This suggests that subjective wellbeing is a function of our Core Affect.

The processes through which Affect infuses judgements of subjective well-being

This thesis clarifies the processing routes through which Affect can influence global subjective well-being, and reveals that the strength of these processing routes is moderated by dispositional factors. This has important implications that furthers understanding in the field of subjective well-being. The portfolio focuses on the client characteristics that are indicated to be influential upon the effectiveness, and thus the suitability of cognitive behavioural therapy. Four case studies are presented which illustrate how the suitability of CBT can be influenced by client factors.

Women's psychosocial well-being following a major life transition

Some women are devastated by divorce, while others learn from the experience. In-depth interviews with sole-parenting women yielded themes that were then assessed using structured questionnaires. Statistical models showed that psychological adjustment and physical well-being related more strongly to psychological factors, such as sense of coherence, than to situational variables.

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.