Will Money Increase Subjective Well-Being?

“Richer people and people living in wealthier nations report higher SWB than poorer people and people living in poorer nations (Diener et al. 1995; Diener and Biwas-Diener 2002; Howell and Howell 2008).”

“Past research has found that, not surprisingly, individuals’ sense of well-being is strongly associated with income (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002), helping co-workers (George, 1991), and giving social support to colleagues (Iverson, Olekalns, & Erwin, 1998).”

“Personal income is important for happiness up to a point, but adds little to happiness once basic needs are met (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002; Inglehart, 1990).”

“First, the financial status of the individual may represent a possible common ground both for value orientation of aspirations (see Kasser et al. 1995; Sheldon and Kasser 2008) and wellbeing (Diener and Biswas-Diener 2002; Headey et al. 2008).”

“More economic support can help increase the SWB so the elderly can avoid poverty and lead a relatively good life [46].”

“The available literature on SWB relative to income is extensive (see Diener and Biswas-Diener 2002; Diener et al.”

“Contrary to popular opinion, it has been established that there is a diminishing marginal utility of rewards associated with social mobility such as income (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002; Frey & Stutzer, 2002).”

“Such factors, however, have been shown to account for only a small amount of variance (Diener and Biswas-Diener 2002).”

“While worldwide studies indicate that people are happier in wealthier countries, the effect of wealth on life satisfaction appears to fade when only relatively wealthy countries are considered (Diener and Biswas-Diener 2002; Diener et al. 2010; Helliwell Layard and Sachs 2017).”

“…benefício adicional ao bem-estar - fato já observado por estudos realizados em diferentes nações -, o que sugere uma baixa correlação entre indicadores econômicos e diferentes componentes e formas de bem-estar, como felicidade, satisfação de vida e afeto positivo (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002).”

“Diener and Biswas-Diener (2002) noted that a nation’s wealth is strongly correlated to its citizenry’s subjective well -being, but that financial satisfaction is not strongly correlated to wealth at the individual level.”

“At the individual level, the focus of this research, zero-order correlations between income and well-being are frequently in the vicinity of 0.10–0.20 (Cummins, 2000; Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002; Diener et al., 1993; Easterlin, 2001; Haring, Stock, & Okun, 1984).”

“Self-reports of happiness, well-being, and/or health are often used in social indicators research along with measures of attitudes, goals, and/or stated intentions (e.g., Diener and Biswas-Diener 2002; Huppert et al. 2009).”

“Earlier studies have shown that better life satisfaction is related to higher socioeconomic status and social capital (Barger et al., 2009; Helliwell, 2001), such as income (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002; Diener et al., 2010) and education (Melin et al., 2003; Salinas-Jiménez et al., 2011).”

“Across several studies, a robust correlation between life satisfaction and income has been reported (for reviews, see Diener, 1984; Diener and Biswas-Diener, 2002).”

“…and Bjorck 2008; Myers 2000), employed (Haring et al. 1984; Lucas et al. 2003), healthy (Diener and Seligman 2004; Lyubomrisky et al. 2006; Okun and George 1984; Verbrugge et al. 1994) and sufficiently wealthy to meet basic needs (Diener and Biswas-Diener 2002; Diener et al. 1993, 1995, 2010).”

“However, because fundamental financial security is generally held to be more important for individual well-being than excessive wealth (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002; Diener, Oishi, & Lucas, 2003; Diener & Seligman, 2004; Veenhoven, 1991), we believe this measure is suitable for the aim of the…”

“An excellent review examining evidence for the relation between income and SWB was written by Diener and Biswas-Diener (2002) (see also Clark, Frijters, & Shields, 2008).”

“Correlations between income and SWB are only moderately high at the lower economic levels and in the poorest countries (Veenhoven 1991; Diener et al. 1999; Diener and Lucas 2000; Diener and Biswas-Diener 2002; Biswas-Diener and Diener 2006).”

“Certainly at a societal level it appears to be the case that huge increases in material living standards in the past fifty years have produced no gains in average happiness levels in developed countries (Easterlin, 1995; Diener and Biswas-Diener, 2002), although the same is not true of poorer countries.”

“For the life domain financial situation, for instance, Diener and Biswas-Diener (2002) demonstrated that people with higher incomes and a higher satisfaction with their financial situation generally report higher quality of life as compared to people with lower incomes.”

“Clearly, people who can comfortably meet basic life needs of food and shelter face fewer threats to emotional equanimity than those who struggle to meet such needs (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002).”

“Similar results were obtained in a review of 11 studies conducted by Diener and Biswas-Diener (2002).”

“Subjective wellbeing can be measured by indicators in various life domains including finance such as financial satisfaction (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002).”

“We motivate our study by noting that past research shows a different relationship between income and SWB for men versus women, and this difference may be related to “psychological factors such as needs, desires, and role” (Crowley, 1998; Diener and Biswas-Diener, 2002, p. 131).”

“Higher standard of living is positively associated with higher SWB (Diener and Diener 1995; Diener and Biswas-Diener 2002; Stevenson and Wolfers 2009; Kahneman and Deaton 2010), albeit past research has also found that the contribution of GDP per capital to SWB is small (if any), especially at very high levels of inco…”

“Researchers have debated the relationships between money and happiness (Diener and Biswas-Diener 2002; Tang 2007; Vohs and Baumeister 2011).”

“For example, studies indicate that a pay increase or high income does not necessarily enhance subjective well-being and happiness (Diener and Biswas-Diener 2002; Diener et al. 2010; Easterlin 1995, 2005).”

“To correct for positive skew and account for diminishing hedonic returns of wealth (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002; Kahneman & Deaton, 2010), scores were log transformed prior to analyses (M 3.04, median 3.00, SD 0.81).”

“Some have argued that income contributes to well-being only to the extent that more money helps individuals meet basic needs (e.g., food, clothing, shelter) and avoid poverty (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002).”

“This relatively modest correlation is consistent with the relationship reported in the literature between income and subjective well-being in wealthy countries such as the United States (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002).”

“Some studies have consistently shown a significantly positive but mostly small effect of income on SWB (e.g. Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002; Diener & Oishi, 2000; Myers, 2000; Stevenson & Wolfers, 2008), whereas other studies have indicated that the association between financial status and SWB is…”

“After the emergence of currency, it was revealed that althoughmany studies assumed that the rich would be happier because people could not live without money, money and happiness do not necessarily have a linear relationship (e.g., Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002; Diener & Seligman, 2004).”

“However, these relationships are not necessarily constant across the income distribution, as income is a stronger predictor of well-being among individuals with lower incomes than it is for higher-income individuals (Diener and Biswas-Diener, 2002; Easterlin, 2001).”

“Income and happiness are correlated, especially among low-income individuals (Diener and Biswas-Diener 2002; Diener et al. 1999).”

“For example, quite a few psychologists have examined the inter-national differences in SWB and tried to explain the spatial variation from the perspective of economic development and cultural differences (e.g. Diener et al., 1995a; Diener and Biswas-Diener, 2002; Kahneman et al., 2006; Howell and Howell, 2008; Diener,…”

“For example, happiness is associated with income (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002), favorable appraisals by a superior (Cropanzano &Wright, 1999), helping colleagues (George, 1991), and social support from colleagues and supervisors (Iverson, Olekalns, & Erwin, 1998).”

“For example, SWB helps people interpret life experiences and stress more positively (Lyubomirsky et al., 2005), engage in activities (Dolan et al., 2008), remain supportive to co-workers (George & Brief, 1992), improve their job performance (Cropanzano & Wright, 2001), and earn higher incomes (Diener & Biswas-Diener,…”

“The the ory behind this methodology was first introduced by Zadeh (1965) and then Dubois and Prade (1980). Later, Cheli and Lemmi (1995) modified and developed a contribution by Cerioli and Zani (1990) to the fuzzy theory and proposed the so-called Totally Fuzzy and Relative (TFR) approach.”

“On micro level, when longitudinal data are used, there is no clear evidence of life satisfaction dynamic sign caused by income changes in developed countries (e.g. Diener and Biswas-Diener, 2002).”

“…sociology, economics, and political science who have made major contributions to the study of SWB concur on this assertion (Diener, Sandvik, Seidlitz, and Diener, 1993; cf. also Diener and Biswas-Diener, 2002, Veenhoven, 1991, Frey and Stutzer, 2002a, Inglehart, 1997, 2000; Layard, 2005).”

“In the wellbeing research literature, financial satisfaction is used as an important indicator of general wellbeing (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002).”

“…significant factors related to psychological well-being in old age, other studies revealed that being employed (Jang et al., 2009), economic status (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002), and level of education (Kempen, Brilman, Ranchor, & Ormel, 1999; Wang & Fan, 2006) are not substantial contributors of…”

“…studies have found that happiness as a function of income is increasing at a sharply diminishing rate, meaning that the average increase in happiness generated by an additional dollar is considerably larger for the poor than for the rich [Diener and Biswas-Diener 2002; Stevenson and Wolfers 2008].”

“While income is not the only determinant, it is an important contributor to the QOL ( Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002; Ferriss, 2002b).”

“Indeed, research has shown the relationship between income and well-being to be rather weak, especially for middle- and upper-class individuals in wealthy countries (Diener & Biswas-Diener, 2002).”