International Society for Quality-of-Life Studies (ISQOLS)

1/27/2012: Wellbeing and Public Policy Conference. Wellington, New Zealand 13-15 June 2012

Members of the editorial board of the International Journal of Wellbeing based in Wellington, New Zealand (Victoria University of Wellington and the Open Polytechnic of New Zealand) are hosting an international conference on Wellbeing and Public Policy in Wellington in June this year.

Keynote speakers include:
Andrew Clark, Paris School of Economics, France.
ˇ Robert Cummins, Deakin University, Australia.
Paul Frijters, The University of Queensland, Australia.
Robert MacCulloch, University of Auckland, New Zealand.

Delegates from the Australian Treasury and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development have also expressed interest in attending.

We particularly keen to engage with an international audience of scholars and invite you to read and pass on this attached bulletin.

Email: wellbeingandpublicpolicy@gmail.com
Conference website: http://www.wellbeingandpublicpolicy.org/index.html

1/27/2012: Well-being in Contemporary Society: International Conference on the Philosophy and Science of Well-being and their Practical Importance

Location:             University of Twente, Enschede, Netherlands
Date:                  July 26-27, 2012
Program Chair:    Philip Brey (University of Twente)

Organising committee:                
Johnny Hartz Sřraker (University of Twente)
Pak-Hang Wong (University of Twente)
Jan-Willem van der Rijt (University of Amsterdam)
Jelle de Boer (University of Amsterdam)
Web site:            http://sites.google.com/site/wics2012/

Keynote Speakers:
Bruno S. Frey (Professor of Economics, University of Zurich)
Valerie Tiberius (Professor of Philosophy, University of Minnesota)
J. D. Trout (Professor of Philosophy and Psychology, Loyola University Chicago)

Invited speakers (confirmed as of January 26):
Erik Angner (Philosophy, Economics and Public Policy, George Mason Univ.)
Ernst Bohlmeyer (Psychology, University of Twente)
Jo Littler (Media and Cultural Studies, Middlesex University)
Raffaele Rodogno (Philosophy, Aarhus University)
Eunkook M. Suh (Psychology, Yonsei University)
Miriam Teschl (Economics, University of Vienna)

About the Conference
In recent years, well-being has enjoyed a renaissance in philosophical discussions, as well as in fields like psychology, economics, development studies and sociology. Although these approaches share a common goal ? to better understand what well-being is and how it can be enhanced ? these developments have led to a great diversity in philosophical and scientific approaches to the analysis of well-being. Despite the increasing amount of research, most of the work on well-being is also performed at a highly abstract level. This is especially true in philosophy, but relatively little work has been devoted to the application of theories of well-being also in other fields, in particular when it comes to an understanding of life in contemporary society. Developments such as globalization, consumerism, and the rapid innovation and use of new and emerging technologies, all exert significant impact on the well-being of people living today, and we need a better understanding of their consequences for well-being.
Contemporary society requires that well-being researchers examine these problems ? and, if possible, propose solutions to address them. This international conference aims to bring together researchers from various disciplines, including, but not limited to, psychology, economics, sociology, philosophy and development studies, in order to examine the practical role of well-being in contemporary society.

Potential Topics
We are looking for contributions that examine the notion of well-being in the context of contemporary society. The conference particularly welcomes papers that employ a notion of well-being to address social, political and ethical issues in present-day society. Suggested topics for the workshop include, but are not limited to:

?             Theoretical developments and approaches in the philosophy and science of well-being in relation to contemporary society, culture and life.
?             Well-being in social and political philosophy and/or in policy studies
?             Positive psychology (and related research fields) and its practical applicability
?             New and emerging technologies and well-being
?             Intercultural and interpersonal comparisons of well-being
?             Reliability, validity and applicability of well-being measures
?             Other specific practical issues pertaining to well-being in contemporary society

The workshop will include both invited papers and an open call for papers. For the open call, we invite extended abstracts (1500-2000 words).  Please anonymise the abstract, and include title, name and address in the accompanying email. The abstract, and any questions you may have about the conference, should be sent to wics2012@utwente.nl. Your abstract should be submitted before February 15th 2012, and will be subject to blind peer review.
?
Publication
Following the conference we aim to publish the papers, subject to a blind review process, in either an edited volume or a special issue of a relevant journal. We did so successfully with our previous conference, Good Life In a Technological Age, from which select papers were published as a book in the prestigious Routledge Studies in Science, Technology and Society series, and will be available in February 2012.

Registration Fees (includes lunch, coffee breaks and conference materials)
Students, Early-bird (before May 1):       ?30
Students (after May 1): ?50
Regular, Early-bird (before May 1):          ?50
Regular (after May 1):    ?80,-
Optional Conference dinner (on July 26):              ?30,-

(we may be able to waive the registration fee under special circumstances. Please contact us at wics2012@utwente.nl if you would like to inquire about this)

Important Dates
Abstract Submission Deadline:                   February 15. 2012
Notification of Acceptance:                         March 1, 2012
Conference Dates:                                     July 26-27, 2012

1/25/2012: Happiness and the Good Life

Happiness and the Good Life has just been published by Oxford University Press. The book develops a conception of happiness as loving one?s life, valuing it in ways manifested by ample enjoyments and a robust sense of meaning. Taking account of work in positive psychology, the book explores how happiness interacts with other dimensions of good lives?in particular with moral decency and the virtues, authenticity, mental health, self-fulfillment, and meaningfulness. There are chapters on the moral significance of happiness, self-deception and illusion, suffering in happy lives, the paradoxes of happiness, philanthropy, love, work, and politics.

1/21/2012: 4th OECD World Forum on Statistics, Knowledge, and Policies

On behalf of the OECD and the Government of India, we are delighted to confirm the dates for the 4th OECD World Forum on Statistics, Knowledge, and Policies.

The Forum will take place in New Delhi on 16-19 October 2012. More details can be found here.

The Forum website will be established shortly. In the meantime, if you have any questions, please do not hesitate to email: newdelhi2012@oecd.org

1/21/2012: CIC Webinar Series Dates

The dates for the January-March webinar series are as follows:
Jan 26, 2 pm EST: Siegel
Feb 2, 2 pm EST: Sirgy
Feb 16, 2 pm EST: Helmrich
Feb 23, 2 pm EST: Helmstetter / Egbert
Mar 8, 2 pm EST: Epstein
Mar 15, 2 pm EST: Wray

1/20/2012: Positive Psychology and Wellbeing Conference - Positive2012

The Australian Institute of Business Wellbeing is proud to present Positive2012 - the 3rd Australian Positive Psychology and Well Being Conference.

Positive2012 will run over four days from 22 to 25 March 2012 across venues in both Sydney and Wollongong (delegates can attend either venue or both).

Please see our downloadable brochure at http://www.uow.edu.au/content/groups/public/@web/@gsb/documents/doc/uow115714.pdf for further information.

1/17/2012: Recent Publication by Dr. Tomyn on Adolescents using the Personal Wellbeing Index (2)

Reference: Tomyn, A.J., Norrish, J.M., & Cummins, R.A. Online first 2011. Social Indicators Research. The Subjective Wellbeing of Indigenous Australian Adolescents: Validating the Personal Wellbeing Index-School Children.

Abstract
By almost all measures of objective life quality, Indigenous Australians are disadvantaged relative to the general population. However, no measures of their Subjective Wellbeing (SWB) have been published. This paper presents the first such data, normreferenced to the general Australian population. A total of 519 Indigenous adolescents, aged between 12 and 19 years, were administered the Personal Wellbeing Index-School Children, which measures SWB. This scale is a parallel form of the Personal Wellbeing- Adult. The PWI-SC exhibited adequate psychometric properties. Moreover, consistent with SWB Homeostasis theory, participants? mean SWB was within the Australian adult normative range. However, female SWB was lower than males. These results suggest that Indigenous adolescents are resilient.

Keywords: Subjective wellbeing; Indigenous Australians; Adolescents; Personal Wellbeing Index.

1/17/2012: Recent Publication by Dr. Tomyn on Adolescents using the Personal Wellbeing Index (1)

Reference: Tomyn, A.J., Fuller Tyszkiewicz, M.D., & Cummins. R.A. The Personal Wellbeing Index: Psychometric equivalence for Adults and School Children. Online first 2011. Social Indicators Research. DOI 10.1007/s11205-011-9964-9.

Abstract
Despite the wealth of accumulated research evaluating subjective wellbeing (SWB) in children and adults, the validity of scores from parallel forms of SWB measures for each age group has yet to be empirically tested. This study examines the psychometric equivalence of the child and adult forms of the personal wellbeing index (PWI) using multiple-group confirmatory factor analysis. The child sample comprised 1,029 Victorian high-school students (aged 11?20) sampled across three independent studies. The adult sample comprised 1,965 Australian adults drawn from the Australian Unity Wellbeing Index. The results demonstrated strict factorial invariance between both versions, suggesting that the PWI measures the same underlying construct in adolescent and adult populations. These findings provide support for quantitative comparisons between adult and adolescent SWB data as valid.

Keywords: Personal Wellbeing Index; Psychometric equivalence; Adolescents; Adults; Confirmatory factor analysis

1/13/2012: Graciela´s Book Springerbrief

Springer Publishers has launched a new publication outlet for monograph-size books (i.e., small books) in QOL research called SpringerBriefs in Well-Being and Quality-of-Life Research.

SpringerBriefs in Well-Being and Quality-of-Life Research are concise summaries of cutting-edge research and practical applications across the field of well-being and quality of life research. These compact refereed monographs are under the editorial supervision of an international Advisory Board*. Volumes are 50 to 125 pages (approximately 20,000- 70,000 words), with a clear focus. The series covers a range of content from professional to academic such as: snapshots of hot and/or emerging topics, in-depth case studies, and timely reports of state-of-the art analytical techniques. To know more about SpringerBriefs in Well-Being and QOL Research, click here.

Graciela Tonon (Pofessor at Universidad Nacional de Lomas de Zamora in Argentina) and one of our fine ISQOLS colleagues, has just published a very interesting study on "Young People's QOL and Construction of Citizenship" based on her research in Argentina. Attached is a description of her SpringerBrief. Many of you who are interested in issues of youth and QOL may be also interested in reading her work in Argentina.

1/9/2012: Social Indicators Research Volume 105 Number 3

Social Indicators Research Volume 105 Number 3 is now available on SpringerLink

1/5/2012: Examining the Association Between Body Mass Index and Weight Related Quality of Life in Black and White Women

Tiffany L. Cox, Jamy D. Ard, T. Mark Beasley, Jose R. Fernandez, Virginia J. Howard, Ronnete L. Kolotkin, Ross D. Crosby and Olivia Affuso

Applied Research in Quality of Life, online at http://www.springerlink.com/content/aq544nkn449r5201/

Abstract
Obesity not only increases risk for morbidity/mortality, but also impacts the quality of life of obese individuals. In the United States, black women have the highest prevalence of obesity of any other group with approximately 80% of black women over age 20 having a body mass index (BMI)???25 kg/m2. We aimed to examine the association between BMI and quality of life in this high risk population compared to this association in white women, using the Impact of Weight on Quality of Life (IWQOL)-Lite questionnaire. Data from 172 black women (mean BMI?=?35.7; age?=?40.5) and 171 white women (mean BMI?=?35.5; age?=?40.4) were collected between 2000 and 2010 analyzed in 2010. The mean IWQOL-Lite total score was 81.6 for black women compared to 66.9 for white women, a statistically significant difference. Hierarchical linear regression models revealed a significant BMI-by-race interaction indicating that the relationship between BMI and IWQOL-Lite score was moderated by race. Our findings suggest notable differences in weight-related quality of life in black and white women. At similar BMIs, black women consistently reported better quality of life than white women on all IWQOL-Lite subscales. The greatest difference in IWQOL-Lite scores between black and white women was seen in the self-esteem subscale. Additional research is needed to understand how to incorporate the weight perspectives of black women into weight management messages and interventions.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/07/obesity-less-of-a-stigma-for-black-women-than-white-women_n_1135343.html
http://jezebel.com/5866066/shaming-black-women-wont-encourage-them-to-lose-weight
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/news/fullstory_119669.html
http://www.essence.com/2011/12/13/real-talk-is-your-high-self-esteem-stopping-you-from-losing-weight/
http://news.yahoo.com/obesity-less-harmful-self-esteem-black-women-study-190412553.html
http://www.blackwomenshealth.org/news/2011/12/13/womens-health-news-internal/obesity-less-harmful-to-self-esteem-in-black-women-study/
http://www.examiner.com/science-news-in-birmingham/self-esteem-higher-for-black-obese-women
http://newstonight.net/content/black-vs-white-who-can-take-being-fat-better
http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-overweight-stigma-african-american-women.html
http://www.amren.com/mtnews/archives/2011/12/being_overweigh.php
http://www.sciencenewsline.com/psychology/2011120718410047.html
http://www.eurasiareview.com/07122011-being-overweight-not-such-a-stigma-for-african-american-women/
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/238834.php
http://fastfatloss.herulambang.net/?p=199
http://www.health.am/ab/more/being-overweight-not-such-a-stigma/
http://justaskawoman.com/wsnty/?p=2041
http://www.news-medical.net/news/20111208/African-American-women-are-less-psychologically-affected-by-being-overweight.aspx
http://tri-statedefenderonline.com/articlelive/articles/7016/1/Fat-and-happy-black-women-less-bothered-than-white-women-says-study/Page1.html
http://www.alphagalileo.org/ViewItem.aspx?ItemId=115245&CultureCode=en
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-12/s-bon120711.php

12/24/2011: Measuring Progress on the Way to a Sustainable Society

Dear colleagues,

On request of visitors of our website www.ssfindex.com, we have made some improvements on the site, particularly on the homepage. The spider web on the homepage shows you at a glance how your country is doing on its way to a sustainable society. Just choose your country and see for yourself the scores of each of the 24 indicators. Together, the indicators offer you a realistic picture of the level of sustainability of your country.

Take your time to find more interesting information on the site. And use the coming holidays to make a Sustainability Tour. Take a free ride.

We wish you nice holidays and a Happy New Year.

Kind regards,

Geurt van de Kerk
Sustainable Society Foundation

12/23/2011: XI ISQOLS Conference

Due to currently unsolvable problems, the XI ISQOLS conference will NOT take place in Lisbon in June 2012.

The conference will be held at a later date, most likely fall 2012. We will keep you informed about the new dates and location due to time.

We are deeply sorry for any inconvenience that our decision could cause.

12/22/2011: To ISQOLS members and to the QOL research community at large

12/21/2011: Hell Explained by a Chemistry Student (a Christmas uplift shared from Alex Michalos to the QOL research community)

The following is an actual question given on University of Washington chemistry mid term.

...

The answer by one student was so 'profound' that the professor shared it with colleagues, via the Internet, which is, of course, why we now have the pleasure of enjoying it as well :

Bonus Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)?

Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle's Law (gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed) or some variant.

One student, however, wrote the following:

First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and the rate at which they are leaving. I think that we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving. As for how many souls are entering Hell, let's look at the different religions that exist in the world today.

Most of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there is more than one of these religions and since people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all souls go to Hell. With birth and death rates as they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially. Now, we look at the rate of change of the volume in Hell because Boyle's Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added.

This gives two possibilities:

1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose.

2. If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in Hell, then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over...

So which is it?

If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa during my Freshman year that, 'It will be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you,' and take into account the fact that I slept with her last night, then number two must be true, and thus I am sure that Hell is exothermic and has already frozen over. The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore, extinct......leaving only Heaven, thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why, last night, Teresa kept shouting, 'Oh my God.'

THIS STUDENT RECEIVED AN A+.

12/21/2011: Yahoo Finance Interview

Those of you who might be interested in issues material well-being in relation to QOL, you might also be interested in the book, Shiny Objects, authored by Professor James Roberts (QOL researcher) from Baylor University (USA). Here is a link to an interview with Yahoo Finance discussing rampant consumerism, material well-being, and QOL.

12/14/2011: Ed Diener receives the highest honor from APA

I am very pleased to inform you that Ed Diener, a former ISQOLS president and one of our true gurus in the area of subjective well-being research (actually the dean and the founding father of this field of study), has just won the American Psychology Association's Distinguished Scientist Award for lifetime contributions to scientific psychology (for 2012). This is the highest award in psychology.

Please join with me in congratulating Ed for this fine honor. This is not only an honor bestowed on him alone but also to the subjective well-being/happiness/QOL movement at large. Ed Diener's e-mail address is ediener@cyrus.psych.uiuc.edu.

12/12/2011: Call for Papers: Well-being in Contemporary Society
International Conference on the Philosophy and Science of Well-being and their Practical Importance

Location: University of Twente, Enschede, Netherlands
Date: July 26-27, 2012

Program Chair:
Philip Brey (University of Twente)

Organising committee:
Johnny Hartz Sřraker (University of Twente)
Pak-Hang Wong (University of Twente)
Jan-Willem van der Rijt (University of Amsterdam)
Jelle de Boer (University of Amsterdam)

About the Conference
In recent years, well-being has enjoyed a renaissance in philosophical discussions, as well as in fields like psychology, economics, development studies and sociology. Although these approaches share a common goal - to better understand what well-being is and how it can be enhanced - these developments have led to a great diversity in philosophical and scientific approaches to the analysis of well-being. Despite the increasing amount of research, most of the work on well-being is also performed at a highly abstract level. This is especially true in philosophy, but relatively little work has been devoted to the application of theories of well-being also in other fields, in particular when it comes to an understanding of life in contemporary society. Developments such as globalization, consumerism, and the rapid innovation and use of new and emerging technologies, all exert significant impact on the well-being of people living today, and we need a better understanding of their consequences for well-being.

Contemporary society requires that well-being researchers examine these problems - and, if possible, propose solutions to address them. This international conference aims to bring together researchers from various disciplines, including, but not limited to, psychology, economics, sociology, philosophy and development studies, in order to examine the practical role of well-being in contemporary society.

Potential Topics
We are looking for contributions that examine the notion of well-being in the context of contemporary society. The conference particularly welcomes papers that employ a notion of well-being to address social, political and ethical issues in present-day society. Suggested topics for the workshop include, but are not limited to:

• Theoretical developments and approaches in the philosophy and science of well-being in relation to contemporary society, culture and life.
• Well-being in social and political philosophy and/or in policy studies
• Positive psychology (and related research fields) and its practical applicability
• New and emerging technologies and well-being
• Intercultural and interpersonal comparisons of well-being
• Reliability, validity and applicability of well-being measures
• Other specific practical issues pertaining to well-being in contemporary society

The workshop will include both invited papers and an open call for papers. For the open call, we invite extended abstracts (1500-2000 words). Please anonymise the abstract, and include title, name and address in the accompanying email. The abstract, and any questions you may have about the conference, should be sent to wics2012@utwente.nl. Your abstract should be submitted before February 15th 2012, and will be subject to blind peer review.

Publication
Following the conference we aim to publish the papers, subject to a blind review process, in either an edited volume or a special issue of a relevant journal. We did so successfully with our previous conference, Good Life In a Technological Age, from which select papers were published as book in the prestigious Routledge Studies in Science, Technology and Society series, and will be available in February 2012.

Important Dates
Abstract Submission Deadline: February 15. 2012
Notification of Acceptance: March 1, 2012
Conference Dates: July 26-27, 2012

12/09/2011: New Video on Materialism

Below are two video clips about materialism and QOL that are directly related to some of the good works of Jim Roberts (Professor of Marketing at Baylor University) and Tim Kasser (Professor of Psychology at Knox College). Both are QOL researchers par excellence and members of the greater QOL research community. The Roberts video is about his recent book, Shiny Objects. This is an interview on the CBS Early Show (in the U.S.) that took place a couple of days ago. Jim did a great job speaking about materialism and QOL and is certainly a great ambassador of the QOL research community. Tim Kasser?s video is based on his book, the High Price of Materialism, that was published a few years ago. Kasser's book is also an excellent read. The animated video production simplifies the message to the lay audience. Tim is also an ISQOLS Fellow and also is a great ambassador of the QOL research community at large.

The video link to Roberts' interview on CBS is http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=7390635n&tag=contentMain;contentBody

Here is his contact information if you wish to communicate with him.
Dr. James A. Roberts (Jim)
Ben H. Williams Professor of Marketing
Baylor University One Bear Place, #8007 Waco, TX 76798-8007 254.710.4952 (Phone) Shiny Objects Blog: http://blogs.baylor.edu/jim_roberts/ Shiny Obects available November 8th, 2011

The link to Kasser's video on YouTube is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGab38pKscw

In case you would like to communicate with Tim, his contact information is:
Kasser, Tim: Box K-83; Department of Psychology; Knox College; Galesburg IL 61401; tkasser@knox.edu

12/08/2011: Being overweight not such a stigma for African American women
Black women are less psychologically affected by being overweight than white women
New York / Heidelberg, 7 December 2011

While all obese women are less satisfied with the weight-related quality of their lives than women of 'normal' weight, black women report a higher quality of life than white women of the same weight. In addition, black women appear to be more concerned about the physical limitations resulting from their obesity, than by the potential psychological consequences of being overweight or obese. These findings by Dr. Tiffany L. Cox, and her team from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, the Neuropsychiatric Research Institute in Fargo, ND, and Obesity and Quality of Life Consulting in Durham, NC, are published online in Springer's journal Applied Research in Quality of Life.

It is well accepted that obesity does not only increase the risk of subsequent disease, disability and premature death, it also impacts the quality of life of obese individuals. In the United States, approximately 80 percent of black women over the age of 20 are overweight or obese (BMI* equal to or greater than 25).

Cox and colleagues examined the link between BMI and weight-related quality of life in a high-risk sample of obese women (172 black and 171 white) using data collected between 2000 and 2010. An obesity-specific quality of life questionnaire was used to examine five areas: physical function, self-esteem, sexual life, public distress and work.

The researchers found that for all women, as BMI rose, quality of life fell. However, there were notable differences in weight-related quality of life between black and white women. At similar BMIs, black women consistently scored higher on quality of life measures than white women, with self-esteem being particularly higher among black women.

The authors suggest that the relationship between weight and quality of life in black women may be partially explained by body image and social norms. Because black women are typically more accepting of larger body sizes, there may be less reporting of impaired quality of life in this group.

Dr. Cox comments: "The implications of this relationship between weight and quality of life in black women remain unclear. While the highest quality of life is desirable as an indicator of overall well-being, black women's perception of experiencing a high quality of life despite having a high BMI may also dampen motivation for attempting weight loss. Additional research is needed to understand the potentially bidirectional relationship between weight and quality of life in black women."

* Body Mass Index (BMI) is a measure of overweight and obesity. It is given as a ratio (weight in kg)/(height in m)2. A person with a BMI greater than 25 is overweight and greater than 30 is obese.

Reference
Cox TL et al (2011). Examining the association between body mass index and weight related quality of life in black and white women. Applied Research in Quality of Life. DOI 10.1007/s11482-011-9160-8

The full-text article is available to journalists on request.
Contact: Joan Robinson, Springer, tel +49-6221-487-8130, joan.robinson@springer.com

12/08/2011: How's Life?, a new OECD publication on well-being beyond GDP

How's Life?, a new OECD publication released in October, offers a comprehensive picture of what shapes people's lives in 40 countries worldwide. The report assesses 11 specific aspects of life ? ranging from income, jobs and housing to health, education and the environment ? as part of the OECD's ongoing effort to devise new measures for assessing well-being that go beyond GDP. How's Life? is part of the OECD's Better Life Initiative which was launched in May 2011 and seeks to engage citizens in the discussion of what matters most in their lives and what governments should do to improve well-being. Another element of the OECD Better Life Initiative is the Your Better Life Index, an interactive tool that allows people to compare countries' performances according to their own preferences (visit www.oecdbetterlifeindex.org).

12/02/2011: New Springer Books in Quality-of-Life Research

Handbook of Social Indicators and Quality of Life Research
Editor/s: Land, Kenneth C.; Michalos, Alex C.; Sirgy, M. Joseph

Positive Relationships
Editor/s: Roffey, Sue

You may register here for Springer's email services providing you with info on the latest journals in your field.

11/19/2011: Call for abstracts on international "social indicators" and "world suffering", due Dec. 15, 2011

Conference: International Sociological Assoc. Forum, Buenos Aires, Argentina, August 1-4, 2012

Session on World Suffering: Quality of life researchers have focused almost all of their attention on well-being rather than ill-being and happiness rather than unhappiness. Consequently, they have overlooked the wealth of data they have on indicators of suffering. This session solicits re-analysis of social indicator data focusing upon the low end of measures of well-being, quality of life, social progress, and happiness. Also of interest are studies that explicitly measure pain, despair, suffering, or social traumas from either a social or an individual framework. Both qualitative and quantitative evidence are of interest, particularly if they can be compared. Like quality of life and well-being, suffering is generally examined as an outcome or something to be explained by social dysfunctions like poverty. Consider also that suffering may serve as a precipitating cause of poverty, violence, health risks, and other social traumas. The justification for research on suffering is not just a matter of humanitarian concern, but of strategic planning for social and economic progress.

Session Organizer: Ron Anderson

For more information about other sessions on social indicators, the ISA Forum, and submission procedures, please use this link: http://www.isa-sociology.org/buenos-aires-2012/

Abstract Submission Procedure: Submit abstract up to 300 words at this site where you select "Research Committees", then RC55, and follow instructions.

11/18/2011: Open Letter to the European Commission on Socio-economic Sciences and Humanities research in the new FP, 2014-2020

Dear colleagues,

with this message we would like to invite you to sign an Open Letter addressed to the European Commissioner for Research and Innovation (www.eash.eu/openletter2011 ), alerting her to the vital insights that Socio-economic Sciences and Humanities (SSH) contribute to address Europe's and the world's Grand Societal Challenges.

In view of legislative decisions to be taken on the next 100-Billion-worth EU Framework Programme Horizon 2020 (2014-2020), the letter stresses the necessity for a varied and strong research programme in the Socio-economic Sciences and Humanities (SSH): it argues that neglecting such potential contributions as SSH research risks undermining the EU strategy to develop innovative, inclusive and sustainable societies. Yet, there still is a distinct danger of insufficient funding in Horizon 2020 for research areas such as cultural change, demography, education, the economy and globalisation, identity politics and social cohesion, and many others. For background information on these matters see: http://www.eash.eu/openletter2011.

The Open Letter initiative has grown out of deliberations among a number of European umbrella organisations in the area of SSH, and seeks to bring to the attention of the European Commission and national governments the concerns of the largest research community in Europe.

If you agree, that a substantial and independent SSH-centered research programme should be included in all future European Framework Programmes, we invite you to sign the Open Letter online at www.eash.eu/openletter2011. Please also kindly spread this invitation to sign in your institutions and among your networks.

First results of this initiative will be presented to Commissioner Geoghegan-Quinn on 10 November 2011. We hope to be able to point to a high number of signatures as an expression of a groundswell of support and concern among SSH communities. The collection of signatures will, however, continue after this specific date, as the legislative decision process will last for longer.

Thank you in advance for signing and for supporting this initiative. Do not hesitate to contact us if you have any questions: SSH-letter@net4society.eu.

On behalf of the Inter-agency Task Group on SSH.

Sir Roderick Floud (Chair ESF Standing Committee for the Social Sciences)
Professor Milena Zic-Fuchs (Chair ESF Standing Committee for the Humanities)

11/03/2011: The Practical Politics of Well-being

Yesterday Sir Gus O'Donnell, head of the UK civil service, addressed the All Party Parliamentary Group on Wellbeing Economics, on the topic 'Wellbeing Statistics: How Will Whitehall Respond'.

He reported that this new data will influence and improve the policy making process and described some of the steps involved. How it does so, of course, will depend on ministerial priorities and so at the same time we published a pamphlet The Practical Politics of Well-being.

This pamphlet begins with an introduction arguing that whilst well-being knowledge can be used to drive positive, incremental changes, it also has the potential to be used to change the central dynamic of our society in a way that more and more people are calling for. There are then personal contributions from a Labour, Liberal Democrat and Conservative perspective:

• Michael Jacobs argues that the science of well-being provides reinforcement and opportunity for Labour, as well as a 'challenge which goes to the heart of the contemporary social democratic project'.
• Jo Swinson MP argues that well-being science bolsters some, yet challenges other, liberal principles, and that this implies a need to consider how well-being will sit alongside other key liberal values.
• Jonty Oliff-Cooper argues that whilst Conservative backing of the well-being agenda may at first seem strange, conservatives are indeed interested in how individual?s well-being can be maximised, and that well-being offers a possible route to turning conservative thinking into a practical guide for action.

If you are interested in finding our more about our work in the centre for well-being at nef, please visit the website: http://www.neweconomics.org/programmes/well-being.

11/1/2011: Happiness helps you live longer? What new study says

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504763_162-20128498-10391704/happiness-helps-you-live-longer-what-new-study-says/ By Ryan Jaslow

(CBS) Is happiness the key to long life? A provocative new study suggests there might actually be something to that sappy sentiment.

PICTURES: 9 big lies about longevity

It showed that happy folks were 35 percent less likely to die an early death.

For the five-year study - published in the Oct. 31 issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - researchers tracked more than 3,800 older Brits, after questioning them on their emotional states on the first day of the study. The researchers found 7 percent of the least happy folks died by study's end, compared to less than 4 percent who reported the most happiness.

What exactly does it mean?

"We can't draw the kind of final conclusion that the happiness is leading directly to better survival," study author Dr. Andrew Steptoe, professor of psychology at the University College in London, told USA Today.

Then what's behind the findings? Steptoe told The Telegraph that happiness could be representative of something else in a person's life that contributes to good health.

"For example, happiness is quite strongly linked to good social relationships, and maybe it is things like that that are accounting for the link between happiness and health."

Other experts are raining on this parade.

"There is always room for error, of course; if I get a parking ticket or stub my toe on the way to the study, I'm not going to be particularly happy," Dr. Sarah Pressman, a professor of psychology at the University of Kansas, told Health.com.

Dr. Howard S. Friedman, professor of psychology at the University of California at Riverside and co-author of The Longevity Project, told CBS News in an email that "Trying to be cheery is not the royal road to good health."

His book cited research that showed negative emotions like worrying are more associated with longevity, because worrying prompts people to take better care of themselves.

What does he think of the new study?

"It is a good study because it does not claim that trying to be happier will have direct health benefits," Friedman told CBS News. "The problem is that others use such findings incorrectly to promote a 'be happy, don't worry, don't stress' lifestyle which, ironically, leads neither to health nor happiness."

10/27/2011: Call for papers: FINT Bi-Annual Trust Workshop, Milano, 14-15 June, 2012

The First International Network on Trust (FINT) is an international group of academics and practitioners who are active in the study of trust. Since 2002, we have organized bi-annual trust workshops and published quarterly electronic newsletters. Details of the organization, workshops, newsletters, and other activities can be found at http://www.fintweb.org/.

It is with great pleasure that we invite you to submit papers, symposia, roundtables and interactive workshops to the FINT Bi-Annual Workshop, Milano, 14-15 June, 2012! The guestspeakers of our 6th Bi-Annual Workshop will be Russell Hardin and Kimberly Elsbach.

The detailed CFP can be found at: http://www.fintweb.org/sites/default/files/FINT_Workshop_call_BdJ__1.pdf
The Workshop website is: http://www.eiasm.org/frontoffice/event_announcement.asp?event_id=851

10/27/2011: A Recent Journal Article on Measuring Trust

Many of us use the famous "most people can be trusted" question as a measure of general interpersonal trust in cross-national comparisons. Yet a new article just published in the American Sociological Review, co-authored by ISQOLS-member Jan Delhey, found out that cross-national comparisons of trust figures are more complicated than previously thought, in particular when Western and Asian countries are compared. The authors come up with a calibrated measure of general trust, which is truly comparable across countries and cultures.

Delhey, Jan/Newton, Kenneth/Welzel, Christian (2011): How General is Trust in 'Most People'? Solving the Radius of Trust Problem. American Sociological Review. Vol 76, No. 5, p. 786-807.

Article abstract
Generalized trust has become a paramount topic throughout the social sciences, both in its own right and as the key "civic" component of social capital. So far, cross-national research relies on the standard question: "Generally speaking, would you say that most people can be trusted or that you need to be very careful in dealing with people?," but the radius problem - how wide a circle of others respondents imagine as "most people" - makes comparisons between individuals and countries problematic. Until now, much about the radius problem was speculation, but data for some 50 countries from the latest World Value Surveys makes it possible to estimate how wide the trust radius actually is. This is done by relating the responses to the standard trust question to a new battery of items that measures both in-group and out-group trust. In 41 out of 51 countries, "most people" in the standard question predominantly connotes out-groups. To this extent, it is a valid measure of general trust in others. Nevertheless, the radius of "most people" varies considerably across countries, being substantially narrower in Confucian countries, and wider in wealthy countries. Therefore, some country rankings on trust change dramatically when the standard question is replaced by a radius-adjusted trust score. In cross-country regressions, the radius of trust matters for civic attitudes and behaviours, so that the assumed civic nature of trust depends on a wide radius.

10/25/2011: Social Determinants, Health Equity and Human Development

Click Here to view website of this Ebook.

A refreshing and useful resource for understanding the multidimensional aspects linking social determinants to health equity and development. The book is written for researchers, students, public health practitioners, health decision makers, health economists, epidemiologists, sociologists, demographers and general public audience with interest in health equity and development. The nine chapters presented are clear and comprehensive, reinforced by several diagrams and real examples illustrating inequity in health. The book is illustrated with 45 tables and figures, and contains 355 recent references to the literature.

Contents
Chapter 1: Measurements and Indicators: Definitions, Concepts and Examples

10/25/2011: Measuring progress and well-being: Achievements and challenges of a new global movement

A report has been published this month entitled: "Measuring progress and well-being: Achievements and challenges of a new global movement."

It features some of the recent efforts by governments, statistical offices, civil society and academia to measure well-being for public policy, which are of course based on several decades of research by the QOL community.

The report, authored by Christian Kroll (LSE), can be downloaded from the Wikiprogress website (bottom of page) here.

An additional policy paper, also available on that website, explores potential consequences from the current international debate on measuring progress and well-being for political stakeholders.

10/20/2011: The genetics of happiness

Transporter of delight

Happiness is in your DNA; and different races may have different propensities for it
Oct 15th 2011 | from the print edition The Economist (http://www.economist.com/node/21532247)

THE idea that the human personality is a blank slate, to be written upon only by experience, prevailed for most of the second half of the 20th century. Over the past two decades, however, that notion has been undermined. Studies comparing identical with non-identical twins have helped to establish the heritability of many aspects of behaviour, and examination of DNA has uncovered some of the genes responsible. Recent work on both these fronts suggests that happiness is highly heritable.

As any human being knows, many factors govern whether people are happy or unhappy. External circumstances are important: employed people are happier than unemployed ones and better-off people than poor ones. Age has a role, too: the young and the old are happier than the middle-aged. But personality is the single biggest determinant: extroverts are happier than introverts, and confident people happier than anxious ones.

That personality, along with intelligence, is at least partly heritable is becoming increasingly clear; so, presumably, the tendency to be happy or miserable is, to some extent, passed on through DNA. To try to establish just what that extent is, a group of scientists from University College, London; Harvard Medical School; the University of California, San Diego; and the University of Zurich examined over 1,000 pairs of twins from a huge study on the health of American adolescents. In ?Genes, Economics and Happiness?, a working paper from the University of Zurich's Institute for Empirical Research in Economics, they conclude that about a third of the variation in people's happiness is heritable. That is along the lines of, though a little lower than, previous estimates on the subject.

But while twin studies are useful for establishing the extent to which a characteristic is heritable, they do not finger the particular genes at work. One of the researchers, Jan-Emmanuel De Neve, of University College, London, and the London School of Economics, has tried to do just that, by picking a popular suspect?the gene that encodes the serotonin-transporter protein, a molecule that shuffles a brain messenger called serotonin through cell membranes?and examining how variants of that gene affect levels of happiness.

Serotonin is involved in mood regulation. Serotonin transporters are crucial to this job. The serotonin-transporter gene comes in two functional variants?long and short. The long one produces more transporter-protein molecules than the short one. People have two versions (known as alleles) of each gene, one from each parent. So some have two short alleles, some have two long ones, and the rest have one of each.

The adolescents in Dr De Neve's study were asked to grade themselves from very satisfied to very dissatisfied. Dr De Neve found that those with one long allele were 8% more likely than those with none to describe themselves as very satisfied; those with two long alleles were 17% more likely.

Which is interesting. Where the story could become controversial is when the ethnic origins of the volunteers are taken into account. All were Americans, but they were asked to classify themselves by race as well. On average, the Asian Americans in the sample had 0.69 long genes, the black Americans had 1.47 and the white Americans had 1.12.

That result sits comfortably with other studies showing that, on average, Asian countries report lower levels of happiness than their GDP per head would suggest. African countries, however, are all over the place, happinesswise. But that is not surprising, either. Africa is the most genetically diverse continent, because that is where humanity evolved (Asians, Europeans, Aboriginal Australians and Amerindians are all descended from a few adventurers who left Africa about 60,000 years ago). Black Americans, mostly the descendants of slaves carried away from a few places in west Africa, cannot possibly be representative of the whole continent.

That some populations have more of the long version of the serotonin-transporter gene has been noticed before, though the association has previously been made at a national, rather than a racial, level. In a paper in the Proceedings of the Royal Society, published in 2009, Joan Chiao and Katherine Blizinsky of Northwestern University, in Illinois, found a positive correlation between higher levels of the short version of the gene and mood disorders (China and Japan have lots of both) and with collectivist political systems. Their hypothesis is that cultures prone to anxiety tend towards systems that emphasise social harmony and away from ones that emphasise individuals' independence of each other.

This latter study may be a few steps too far along the road to genetic determinism for some people. But there is growing interest in the study of happiness, not just among geneticists but also among economists and policymakers dissatisfied with current ways of measuring humanity's achievements. Future work in this field will be read avidly in those circles.

10/19/2011: New index of wellbeing challenges Canada's GDP as sole measure of progress

EMBARGOED TILL 12:01 am October 20, 2011

New index of wellbeing challenges Canada's GDP as sole measure of progress

Waterloo, Ont. - Canada has become a world leader in measuring wellbeing with the launch of a new comprehensive composite index set to challenge the gross domestic product (GDP) as the sole measure of our country's progress, says the Honourable Roy Romanow, advisory board chair for the Canadian Index of Wellbeing (CIW), located at the University of Waterloo.

The CIW today is releasing a comprehensive composite index designed by an interdisciplinary team of accomplished Canadian and international experts to measure the overall wellbeing of Canada. It shows that Canadians' quality of life hasn't improved at anywhere near the pace of economic growth as measured by GDP.

"Since 1994, the starting point for the CIW, Canada's wellbeing has seen an overall improvement of 11 per cent - paling in comparison to the 31 per cent growth in the country's GDP over that same time frame," says Romanow.

"The CIW shows us what GDP cannot: our country is not reaping all of the benefits of our economic growth. Our quality of life has actually gone down in areas such as the environment, leisure and culture, and time use, with only modest gains in health. And even in areas where growth has been robust, our research shows that it was the top 20 per cent that received the lion's share of rising income and wealth during the boom years, while the gap down to the bottom 20 per cent grew even larger. That's the Canadian reality."

Seen as a global leader by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the CIW composite index is based on 64 separate indicators in eight interconnected categories, built to reflect real Canadian life.

"This may well be a defining moment in our new economic reality," says CIW deputy chair, the Honourable Monique Bégin. "By providing an accurate snapshot of how Canada's wellbeing is faring over time, the CIW gives us the tools we need to hold governments accountable for their actions and decisions - so that our quality of life grows along with GDP."

Located in Waterloo's faculty of applied health sciences, the CIW provides an opportunity to bring together experts in all aspects of wellbeing. The faculty has been an international leader for over 40 years in research related to promoting health and optimizing quality of life.

"This is an exciting first step toward a better understanding of the complexity of our wellbeing", says Bryan Smale, professor in the faculty of applied health sciences and director of the CIW. "The reports we will be generating in the coming years will drive the conversation leading to real social change that will enhance Canadian lives"

Today's release of the CIW puts Canada ahead of France and the UK, countries also on their way to developing a similar index.

To learn more about the CIW or enjoy a short video and infographic please visit: www.ciw.ca

About Waterloo
In just half a century, the University of Waterloo, located at the heart of Canada's Technology Triangle, has become one of Canada's leading comprehensive universities with 30,000 full- and part-time students in undergraduate and graduate programs. Waterloo, as home to the world's largest post-secondary co-operative education program, embraces its connections to the world and encourages enterprising partnerships in learning, research and discovery. In the next decade, the university is committed to building a better future for Canada and the world by championing innovation and collaboration to create solutions relevant to the needs of today and tomorrow. For further details, visit www.uwaterloo.ca.

Sarah Jordison, CIW media relations (416) 578-5638
Michael Strickland, UW media relations, (519) 888-4777 or michael.strickland@uwaterloo.ca

10/19/2011: Time on your hands - good or bad?

A sensible, balanced amount of free time is key to happiness in our consumer society

New York / Heidelberg, 19 October 2011

What is more desirable: too little or too much spare time on your hands? To be happy, somewhere in the middle, according to Chris Manolis and James Roberts from Xavier University in Cincinnati and Baylor University in Waco, TX. Their work shows that materialistic young people with compulsive buying issues need just the right amount of spare time to feel happier. The study is published online in Springer's journal Applied Research in Quality of Life.

We now live in a society where time is of the essence. The perception of a shortage of time, or time pressure, is linked to lower levels of happiness. At the same time, our consumer culture, characterized by materialism and compulsive buying, also has an effect on people's happiness: the desire for materialistic possessions leads to lower life satisfaction.

Given the importance of time in contemporary life, Manolis and Roberts investigate, for the first time, the effect of perceived time affluence (the amount of spare time one perceives he or she has) on the consequences of materialistic values and compulsive buying for adolescent well-being.

A total of 1,329 adolescents from a public high school in a large metropolitan area of the Midwestern United States took part in the study. The researchers measured how much spare time the young people thought they had; the extent to which they held materialistic values and had compulsive buying tendencies; and their subjective well-being, or self-rated happiness.

Manolis and Roberts' findings confirm that both materialism and compulsive buying have a negative impact on teenagers' happiness. The more materialistic they are and the more they engage in compulsive buying, the lower their happiness levels.

In addition, time affluence moderates the negative consequences of both materialism and compulsive buying in this group. Specifically, moderate time affluence i.e. being neither too busy, nor having too much spare time, is linked to higher levels of happiness in materialistic teenagers and those who are compulsive buyers.

Those who suffer from time pressures and think materialistically and/or purchase compulsively feel less happy compared with their adolescent counterparts. Equally, having too much free time on their hands exacerbates the negative effects of material values and compulsive buying on adolescent happiness.

The authors conclude: "Living with a sensible, balanced amount of free time promotes well-being not only directly, but also by helping to alleviate some of the negative side effects associated with living in our consumer-orientated society."

Reference
Manolis C & Roberts JA (2011). Subjective well-being among adolescent consumers: the effects of materialism, compulsive buying, and time affluence. Applied Research in Quality of Life.

DOI 10.1007/s11482-011-9155-5

The full-text article is available to journalists on request.
Contact: Joan Robinson, Springer, tel +49-6221-487-8130, joan.robinson@springer.com

10/19/2011: Interesting dissertation on happiness

Dutch psychologist Ad Bergsma wrote an interesting dissertation in which he addressed the following questions: 1) What is the quality of popular happiness advice? 2) Is unhappiness concentrated among people with mental disorders and 3) Does the pursuit of happiness cover all ground? The full text can be downloaded from the library of Erasmus University Rotterdam at: hdl.handle.net/1765/22825

10/19/2011: Aging, Mobility and Quality of Life Conference

The Aging, Mobility and Quality of Life (AMQoL) conference will focus on meeting the transport/mobility needs of older adults so as to improve their access to the various activities and services that underlie health, well-being, and quality of life.

This interdisciplinary conference will bring together experts from: gerontology/geriatrics; transport safety; psychology; sociology; social work; urban planning; engineering; tourism and leisure; occupational therapy; and medicine. Topics will address the mobility-related characteristics of older adults (e.g., aging in developing and newly industrialized countries, exercise and health, personal security, social participation, spatial cognition and way finding, tourism and leisure, travel behavior, transport safety), as well as technological and policy responses to enhancing transport/mobility (e.g., assistive technologies, building design, community transport, roadway design, transport policy, urban planning and environmental design, vehicle design).

Please consider submitting an abstract for the AMQoL conference and let your colleagues know about this opportunity. Abstracts are due by February 13, 2012. To learn more about the conference and the abstract submission process, please go to the conference website: http://agingmobilityconference.com/.

Dr. David W. Eby from the University of Michigan, USA is the Conference Chair. Vice Chairs are: Dr. Antonio Páez, McMaster University, Canada; Dr. Jan-Dirk Schmöcker, Kyoto University, Japan; and Dr. Tim Schwanen, University of Oxford, UK.

The 2-day conference will feature individual presentations and poster sessions, dedicated symposia on exercise and health, transport safety, tourism and leisure, urban design, assistive technologies, and dementia; and keynote addresses on cross cutting themes. Keynote speakers include:

• Christine Milligan, Professor of Health and Social Geography and Director of the Centre for Ageing Research in the School of Health and Medicine at Lancaster University, UK.
• Martin Wachs, Senior Principal Researcher and former Director of the Transportation, Space and Technology Program at the RAND Corporation, Professor Emeritus of Civil & Environmental Engineering and of City & Regional Planning at the University of California, Berkeley (where he directed the Institute of Transportation Studies), and past Chairman of the UCLA Department of Urban Planning.
• James S. Jackson, the Daniel Katz Distinguished University Professor of Psychology, Professor of Health Behavior and Health Education, School of Public Health, and Director and Research Professor of the Institute for Social Research.

Lisa J. Molnar, AMQoL Scientific Coordinator

10/11/2011: Can Scientists Predict How Happy You'll Be When You're Old?
By Bernie Wong | September 16, 2011 | http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/research_digest/can_scientists_predict_how_happy_youll_be_when_youre_old/

New research examines the factors that most affect our happiness as we age.

What Predicts Happiness?

"Predicting Well-Being From Personality in Adolescents and Older Adults"
Butkovic, A., Irma Brkovic, & Bratko. Journal of Happiness Studies, forthcoming 2011.

This study explored whether it's possible to predict people's happiness based on their personality, looking at both adolescents and older adults. The researchers gave surveys to 223 high school students and 134 adults, ages 54 to 90, measuring their happiness levels, self-esteem, loneliness, and general psychological health; they also assessed the participants' personalities. The results show that demographic factors like age, gender, and marital status held little sway over happiness and general psychological health for adults and teens alike; education had only a slight influence on self-esteem and psychological well-being for older adults.

Personality, however, was the most strongly linked to happiness and psychological well-being throughout life, even more so among adolescents than adults. The most important personality factors were extroversion (how outgoing someone is) and ?emotional stability,? meaning that someone is not easily upset and doesn't suffer from persistent negative feelings. The authors suggest that personality affects happiness less among older adults because the relative influences of health, education, and relationships increase as people age. -Bernie Wong

The Key to Lasting Life Satisfaction

"Happiness and Suffering in the Life Story: An Inquiry into Conflicting Expectations Concerning the Association of Perceived Past with Present Subjective Well-Being in Old Age"
Shmotkin, D. & Shrira, A. Journal of Happiness Studies, forthcoming 2011.

Happy experiences make you happy and sad experiences make you sad, right? This study suggests it's more complicated than that. Researchers asked 815 participants, ranging from 58 to 95 years of age, about their life story, particularly their ?anchor? periods (i.e., the most emotionally significant points in life), as well as the most positive and negative periods of their lives. They also recorded participants' overall life satisfaction. Not surprisingly, the researchers found that the intensity of happiness during positive periods was significantly higher than happiness during negative periods; it was also more intense than the level of sadness during both positive and negative periods.

The main finding, however, concerned how happiness and sadness during past happy or sad times help predict current happiness. Though happiness during happy times may boost life satisfaction, frequent sadness during sad times, and even happiness during sad times, can lead to low life satisfaction. In essence, happiness and suffering by themselves don't determine overall life satisfaction; instead, what matters is the context in which these fleeting feelings are experienced, and how the sum of these experiences add up over time. -Bernie Wong

10/06/2011: Research Instruments

Anyone interested can go to http://www.deakin.edu.au/research/acqol/instruments/ for a list of over 1,200 instruments.

10/03/2011: Questionnaire for the Project "Well-being and social cohesion in an unequal society (WEBE)".

A Finnish research team - supervised by professor Juho Saari from the University of Eastern Finland - has started to formulate a questionnaire for the project "Well-being and social cohesion in an unequal society (WEBE)".

A survey will be collected in spring 2012. A framework of the WEBE-project is multidimensional and therefore many concepts should be measured with the survey. Consequently we are monitoring good measures around. We are looking for TESTED, AS SHORT INSTRUMENTS AS POSSIBLE for concepts below.

If you have good measures/indicators for our purpose, we would like to hear more on them! We are also open for collaboration in WEBE-project (comparisons between different nations etc.).

On behalf of WEBE-team, Sakari Kainulainen

9/30/2011: Investigating Quality of Urban Life

This volume synthesizes past and current, international research on the quality of urban life. It emphasizes the contributions of the urban environment to the overall well-being of residents living in urban areas ranging in scale from small cities and their hinterlands to metropolitan regions. The term urban environment refers to the socio-physical aspects of urban living ranging from individual dwellings and neighborhoods to public services (i.e. transportation, rubbish collection, etc.) to neighbors and community organizations. The work emphasizes not only perceptions of and behaviors within urban environments but the actual conditions to which individuals are responding. The research covers both the subjective and behavioral aspects of urban living as well as the objective conditions which drive them.

Drawing on collaborative research with a broad group of researchers in a variety of settings around the world, the book incorporates theoretical and methodological approaches to the conceptualizing and measuring of quality of life. It covers research designs that are based on both the analysis and modeling of aggregate secondary data and on the collection, analysis and modeling of primary survey data on subjective urban quality of life.

Here's the website: http://www.springer.com/social+sciences/well-being/book/978-94-007-1741-1

9/13/2011: Deadline (September 30th) is Fast Approaching for Chapter Submission to Volume 6 of Community QOL Indicators: Best Cases

If you are interested in submitting a chapter for Community QOL Indicators: Best Practices VI, please click here.

9/13/2011: CRESS 2011 Perspectives on Wellbeing at Work Conference

September 2011 CRESS is holding a conference on "Perspectives on wellbeing at work" at the Hallam Conference Centre, in London. This one day conference will bring together international experts in the fields of personnel and behavioural economics, organizational and social psychology, and human resource management, to present the latest research findings on ?wellbeing at work'. Keynote speakers include: Yehuda Baruch, Andrew Clark, Stephen Garcia, Mustafa Ozbilgin, and OdedStark.

For more information and to reserve a place please click here.

8/15/2011: Capabilities and Happiness on Multiple Dimensions in High Income Countries

We are revising our survey instrument for measuring quality of life and would be happy to receive any comments over the next three weeks or so. So far as we know, this is the ONLY quality of life indicator to incorporate modules on capabilities and therefore reflect all three of Sen's key equations! Anyone interested should just email Paul Anand and he can provide some material on what we hope to do. (This is an Open/Oxford/Birkbeck collaboration funded by Leverhulme Trust.) We shall be meeting in Oxford on 23rd September to discuss any suggestions colleagues make.

8/15/2011: New RCT and Training Seminars for Download

A new randomized controlled trial of Quality of Life Therapy and Coaching (qoltc) funded by the USA NIH found qoltc more effective than two alternate interventions; also, the Quality of Life Inventory or QOLI showed sensitivity to this intervention related change. This third rct trial of qoltc is available free online at the journal's website:

Rodrigue, J.R. Mandelbrot, D.A., and Pavlakis, M. (2011). A psychological intervention to improve quality of life and reduce psychological distress in adults awaiting kidney transplantation. Nephrology Dialysis Transplantation, 26(2): 709-715. doi:10.1093/ndt/gfq382.

Marty Seligman already refers to Quality of Life Therapy and Coaching as evidence-based/empirically supported in his book, Flourish.

A free video webinar and ppt on this approach to well-being intervention and assessment is available for download at http://psychcorp.pearsonassessments.com/pai/ca/training/webinars/QOLIWebinar.htm

You may also use this site to sign up for the next, free live webinar to be held Thursday, September 22nd at 1:00 pm Eastern Daylight Time.

8/14/2011: New Book on Sibling Relationships and Well Being/Quality of Life

A new book has been published on sibling relationships and well being/quality of life by Columbia University Press. For more information, follow the following link:
http://cup.columbia.edu/book/978-0-231-15708-7/sibling-relationships-in-childhood-and-adolescence

8/02/2011: A Book from Happiness Economics Guru Richard Easterlin: Happiness, Growth, and the Life Cycle

It is a pleasure to announce the publication of yet another book on happiness economics by our American dean of happiness economics, Richard Easterlin. His new book is another MUST READ. The title of the book is Happiness, Growth, and the Lifecycle, published by Oxford University Press. Click here to read the flier.

8/01/2011: Carol Graham, a happiness economist and an ISQOLS member, in the news (Financial Times)

Kudos for Carol Graham, a happiness economist/public policy researcher and one of our ISQOLS distinguished members, is in the news again for her latest book, the Pursuit of Happiness: An Economy of Well-Being. The Financial Times article can be read at: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/11a3da28-b6a5-11e0-ae1f-00144feabdc0.html

Thanks Carol for popularizing the happiness economics movement.

8/01/2011: New Directions in Wellfare OECD Conference Website

A couple of things to announce:

• Many OECD-joint universities congress on welfare economics have been published this month to the programme website: http://www.open.ac.uk/socialsciences/welfareconomicstheory/2011/programme.php
• In addition, colleagues may be interested in the OECD compendium of Better Life Indicators which can downloaded from: http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/4/31/47917288.pdf

8/01/2011: Special Issue on Happiness Economics by Bernard van Praag and Ada Ferrer-i-Carbonell

A booklet recently appeared in the Foundations and Trends in Microeconomics (FnT MIC),chief editor W.Kip-Viscusi. Volume 6, Issue 1 Happiness Economics: A New Road to Measuring and Comparing Happiness by Bernard M. S. Van Praag (University of Amsterdam) and Ada Ferrer-i-Carbonell (Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona).

This series is aimed at making economists and other social scientists aware of new developments in economics by summarizing in a nutshell the main headlines of a specific subject. A number of prominent economists have already published in this series. Now the well-known happiness economists Van Praag and Ferrer-i-Carbonell, authors of the monograph Happiness Quantified (2008,OUP), contributed a first up-to-date primer on the most recent developments in happiness economics, including their own work. In about 100 pages they succeed in summarizing the main trends in the field.

The list of contents is:

1. Introduction
2. Happiness: Methods of analysis
3. Life satisfaction, happiness
4. Domain satisfactions
5. Cardinal or ordinal?
6. Aggregating domain satisfactions to life satisfaction
7. Leyden School
8. Reference groups
9. Memory, Anticipation and Adaptation
10. Climate and other external effects
11. Poverty
12. Macro-economic determinants of happiness
13. Inequality
14. Satisfaction and Vignettes
15. The significance of Happiness economics for normative economics
16. Concluding observations, research and applications for the future
17. References

7/28/2011: Carol Graham's latest book on happiness and economics

Carol Graham, one of our fine and hard working ISQOLS members, has written another great book. It is called the Pursuit of Happiness: An Economy of Well-Being. It is published by the Brookings Institution. It is a must read to all QOL researchers interested in happiness and economics research.

7/28/2011: Article by Richard Easterlin in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (USA): the Happiness-Income Paradox Revisited

Richard A. Easterlin, Laura Angelescu McVey, Malgorzata Switek, Onnicha Sawangfa, and Jacqueline Smith Zweig

The striking thing about the happiness-income paradox is that over the long-term-usually a period of 10y or more-happiness does not increase as a country's income rises. Heretofore the evidence for this was limited to developed countries. This article presents evidence that the long term nil relationship between happiness and income holds also for a number of developing countries, the eastern European countries transitioning from socialism to capitalism, and an even wider sample of developed countries than previously studied. It also finds that in the short-term in all three groups of countries, happiness and income go together, i.e., happiness tends to fall in economic contractions and rise in expansions. Recent critiques of the paradox, claiming the time series relationship between happiness and income is positive, are the result either of a statistical artifact or a confusion of the short-term relationship with the long-term one.

7/28/2011: A recent survey looks at the link between money and happiness during hard times.

Read the full article here.

7/28/2011: A new study suggests Americans' happiness declines when there's a wider gap between rich and poor.

Read the full article here.

7/24/2011: First Workshop of Italian Association for Quality of Life Studies (AIQUAV)

The Italian Association for Quality of Life Studies (AIQUAV), in cooperation with Dipartimento di Metodi Quantitativi per le Scienze Economiche ed Aziendali - Uni-Bicocca Centro di Ricerca Interuniversitario per i servizi di Pubblica Utilitŕ (CRISP) organized the workshop "Exploring and Exploiting complexity quality of life: epistemological, Methodological and statistical issues" that will be held in Florence on 9 and 10 September 2011. More information about this event can be found at following address:
http://www.aiquav.it/workshopseminari.html

We invite you to read the program and spread the news among all those you believe may be interested.

7/24/2011: Felicitators, a Special Issue of the International Journal of Wellbeing is now freely available

This Project + symposium celebrates Felicitators, or facilitators of happiness. Its aim is to help shift the focus of wellbeing research from the ?I' to the ?we' by celebrating people and places, ideas and institutions, that have made and can make the world a happier place.

Two central ideas underlie the symposium. The first is to use particular stories and examples as a way of assembling and explaining fundamental results from wellbeing research. The second is to encourage the spread of wellbeing by celebrating felicitators, and especially those whose ideas and actions have broad or universal applicability.

What could Dr Seuss, Maria Montessori, Bruder Klaus, Central Park, Singapore prisons, Moses, the Dalai Lama and music have in common that makes them all felicitators? You can find out, by downloading the special symposium issue from: http://www.internationaljournalofwellbeing.org/

The special issue just became available on July 20, and is open access.

7/21/2011: Call for Chapters for Community Quality-of-Life Indicators: Best Cases VI

Click here to learn more about submission and possible publication in Community Quality-of-Life Indicators: Best Cases VI. This is the sixth volume of this book series that is published jointly between ISQOLS and Springer. The deadline for chapter submission is now extended from August 30th, 2011 to September 30th, 2011.

Those who have good case studies related to community indicator projects, please consider submitting a write-up of your community indicators project for review and possible publication in our sixth volume in this Best Practices book series. For more detail consult the attached announcement or contact one of the co-editors: Joe Sirgy (sirgy@vt.edu), Rhonda Phillips (Rhonda.Phillips@asu.edu), and Don Rahtz (Don.Rahtz@mason.wm.edu).

7/16/2011: The nitty-gritty of going beyond GDP

An interesting article related to indicators systems and their relationship to public policy was published at Remapping Debate. Many QOL researchers who are into public policy may be interested in reading the article here.

7/11/2011: Springer New Print Book Releases

Integrating Agriculture, Conservation and Ecotourism: Examples from the Field
Book Series: Issues in Agroecology - Present Status and Future Prospectus, Vol. 1
Editor/s: Campbell, W. Bruce; López Ortíz, Silvia

The Human Pursuit of Well-Being
Editor/s: Brdar, Ingrid

6/22/2011: Social Indicators Research - Read Editor's Choice Articles for Free

Alex Michalos, Editor-in-Chief, has selected articles recently published in Social Indicators Research (SIR) to read, download, and save as if you were a subscriber. The articles are available online until June 30, 2011. Click here for more information.

The National Association of Planning Councils invites all who are interested in serving communities to join them in Alexandria, Virginia April 15-17 for a different kind of conference.  You will hear from national experts and local practitioners on what the issues are, how your peers are responding, and how you can move from reacting to change to planning for success.

The Community Indicators Consortium (CIC) wants to remind you about their upcoming eConference, April 11-11, 2011. See the website for further details.