Understanding subjective well-being: perspectives from psychology and public health

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Understanding subjective well-being: perspectives from psychology and public health Kirti V. Das1* , Carla Jones-Harrell2, Yingling Fan3, Anu Ramaswami1, Ben Orlove4 and Nisha Botchwey5 * Correspondence: Kirtid@princeton. edu 1 Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Princeton University, E208 Engineering Quadrangle, Princeton, NJ 08544, USA Full list of author information is available at the end of the article

Abstract Background: Individual subjective well-being (SWB) is essential for creating and maintaining healthy, productive societies. The literature on SWB is vast and dispersed across multiple disciplines. However, few reviews have summarized the theoretical and empirical tenets of SWB literature across disciplinary boundaries. Methods: We cataloged and consolidated SWB-related theories and empirical evidence from the fields of psychology and public health using a combination of online catalogs of scholarly articles and online search engines to retrieve relevant articles. For both theories and determinants/correlates of SWB, PubMed, PsychINFO, and Google Scholar were used to obtain relevant articles. Articles for the review were screened for relevance, varied perspectives, journal impact, geographic location of study, and topicality. A core theme of SWB empirical literature was the identification of SWB determinants/correlates, and over 100 research articles were reviewed and summarized for this review. Results: We found that SWB theories can be classified into four groups: fulfillment and engagement theories, personal orientation theories, evaluative theories, and emotional theories. A critical analysis of the conflicts and overlaps between these theories reveals the lack of a coherent theoretical and methodological framework that would make empirical research systematically comparable. We found that determinants/correlates of SWB can be grouped into seven broad categories: basic demographics, socioeconomic status, health and functioning, personality, social support, religion and culture, and geography and infrastructure. However, these are rarely studied consistently or used to test theories. (Continued on next page)

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