Figure 0.2 (top) Articles in The Guardian newspaper mentioning happiness and mental health
Factiva Global News Database.
Figure 0.2 (bottom left) Articles on happiness in academic journals
Taken from the number of papers in the EconLit and Web of Science databases with reference in the title or abstract to: subjective wellbeing, subjective well-being, life-satisfaction, happy, or happiness.
Figure 0.2 (bottom right) Google searches for meditation and yoga
Google Trends. Figures refer to searches in the USA. All figures are normalized on the total number of searches in a given period. For each series, Jan 2008 = 100.
Figure 1.3 How occupations differ in average happiness and average salary in the UK
O’Donnell et al. (2014), p. 72. Numbers relate to mid-career life-satisfaction.
Figure 1.4 Average happiness of British people in each decile of happiness
Gallup World Poll (Answers to the ‘Cantril Ladder’ question: Please imagine a ladder with steps numbered from 0 at the bottom to 10 at the top. Suppose we say that the top of the ladder represents the best possible life for you and the bottom of the ladder represents the worst possible life for you. If the top step is 10 and the bottom step is 0, on which step of the ladder do you feel you personally stand at the present time?). Average = 6.7: Standard deviation = 1.87 for 2015–2017.
Figure 2.1 Happiness affects longevity
Data supplied by Andrew Steptoe. See also Steptoe and Wardle (2012).
Figure 2.2 What explains the variation of adult happiness (in Britain)?
A. E. Clark et al. (2018), Table 16.1. For quality of work index, see p. 74 of that book and chapter 7 of this book. The β-coefficient is 0.20 for the employed population, but for all adults it becomes 0.16 (0.20 times the square root of the employment rate).
Table 2.1 Ranking of countries by their average happiness (on the scale 0–10)
Gallup World Poll. Years 2016–2018. Replies based on the Cantril ladder.
Table 2.2 How is national happiness (0–10) affected by national variables?
Private information from John Helliwell and Haifang Huang. Closely related to Helliwell, Layard and Sachs (2018), Table 2.1, column 1, but including trust and excluding corruption. These trust data are available for one year only and cover 128 countries.
Figure 2.3 Stress is increasing
Gallup World Poll.
Figure 4.1 US students have become more materialistic
Twenge (2017), Figure 6.8, p. 168 (American Freshman Survey 1967–2016).
Figure 4.2. A Norwegian newspaper reflects increasing individualism and reduced communal values
Nafstad et al. (2007)
Figure 5.1 Percentage saying that they had a great deal of confidence in the church or organized religion (USA)
Gallup (http://www.gallup.com/poll/1690/religion.aspx)
Figure 5.2 Ten Keys to Happier Living
Action for Happiness website.
Figure 5.3 The Exploring What Matters course has big effects (two months later)
Krekel et al. (2020).
Figure 6.1 (top) What predicts happiness at age sixteen?
A. E. Clark et al. (2018), Figure 1.5(b).
Figure 6.1 (bottom) What in childhood predicts a happy adult?
A. E. Clark et al. (2018), Figure 1.2.
Table 6.1 Fewer children feel comfortable in school (OECD)
OECD (2017), Fig. III.7.1, p. 119. OECD average of thirty countries, including all OECD countries, with the exception of Chile, Estonia, Israel, Slovenia and the United States. All changes are statistically significant.
Figure 6.2 Wellbeing teaching improves wellbeing and academic performance (Bhutan)
Adler (2016). See also Seligman and Adler (2018). Results after completing a fifteen-month course of two hours per week. One year later these gains remain largely unchanged.
Figure 7.1 Unhappiness depends on who you are with (USA)
Krueger (2009), Table 1.10. US Adults. This shows how much of the time the dominant emotion is unpleasant.
Figure 7.2 Unhappiness depends on what you are doing
Krueger (2009), Table 1.9.
Figure 7.3 How job satisfaction is affected by different aspects of workplace organization
De Neve (2018), cross-section, ISSP.
Figure 7.4 How the STAR experiment improved wellbeing at work
Moen et al. (2016). We focus on results for the experiment before the company was merged with another company. Effect sizes are taken from Table 2, Panel A. Standardized effect sizes are calculated using the usual-practice control group standard deviations of each measure.
Figure 8.1 How much misery is explained by each factor?
A. E. Clark et al. (2018), Table 6.2, p. 94. Note: These are partial correlation coefficients explaining misery (taken as a 0/1 variable). Income is entered negatively as a continuous variable.
Figure 8.2 Mental illness makes death more likely
E. Walker et al. (2015). These are annual death rates, adjusted for age and gender. Global analysis.
Figure 8.3 Foreign aid discriminates against mental illness
Gilbert et al. (2015) and Charlson et al. (2017).
Figure 8.4 Age at which people died in the UK – 1910 compared to 2016
Human Mortality Database, Period Life Table for England and Wales. Deaths at age 0 not plotted (1910: 10.6 per cent; 2016: 0.4 per cent).
Table 10.1 Percentage of people who feel lonely in Britain
Thomas (2015). Percentage answering 6 or above.
Figure 11.1 Unemployment in Western Europe
OECD.Stat database. The years 2015 and earlier show the percentage of the civilian labour force; the years 2016–2017 show the percentage of the total labour force.
Table 11.1 Inequality has risen in some English-speaking countries and less elsewhere
Gross weekly earnings. OECD. Stat database. (Full-time male employees)
Table 11.2 Average cost of reducing the numbers in misery, by one person
A. E. Clark et al. (2016). For methods of calculation, see online Annex 11.1.
Figure 11.2 Average happiness in China, using five studies, 1990–2015
Helliwell, Layard and Sachs (2017), Figure 3.1. WVS is World Values Survey and CGSS is Chinese General Social Survey.
Figure 12.1 Factors explaining the vote share of the existing government parties (European elections, 1970–2014)
Ward (forthcoming).
Figure 12.2 Conduct of government and average happiness
Gallup World Poll; World Bank. Average happiness refers to the country-average score on the Cantril Ladder in the Gallup World Poll, as reported in the World Happiness Report 2018. Governance data for Figures 12.2 and 12.3 are drawn from the World Bank’s World Governance Indicators, taking an average of 2014–2016 scores. Conduct of government is the mean of the scores for Government Effectiveness, Regulatory Quality, Rule of Law and Control of Corruption.
Figure 12.3 Democracy and average happiness
Gallup World Poll; World Bank. Data sources are the same as for Figure 12.2. Democratic Quality is the mean of the WGI’s scores for Voice and Accountability and Political Stability/Absence of Violence.
Figure 12.4 Size of government in the OECD
World Bank. World Development Indicators, General government final consumption expenditure as percentage of GDP. Simple average of the following countries: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Czech Republic, United Kingdom, United States.
Figure 12.5 (top) Life-satisfaction in Western Europe
Eurobarometer. The question asks people: ‘On the whole are you very satisfied, fairly satisfied, not very satisfied or not at all satisfied with the life you lead?’ Lines refer to the simple mean of the EU-9 countries that have been in the Eurobarometer continuously since 1973. The line for ‘fairly satisfied’ is not shown, but equals 100 per cent minus the responses shown.
Figure 12.5 (bottom) Happiness in the United States
General Social Survey. The question asks respondents: ‘Taken all together, how would you say things are these days – would you say that you are very happy, pretty happy, or not too happy?’ The line for ‘pretty happy’ is not shown, but equals 100 per cent minus the responses shown.
Figure 12.6 Positive tone of the news, 1979–2010
Leetaru (2011). Figure 11 as quoted in Pinker (2018), Fig. 4.1. Units are standard deviations from the mean.
Figure 13.1 (top) Percentage of eighteen-year-olds spending ten or more hours per week online and percentage undertaking four face-to-face social activities
Monitoring the Future, survey of 8th, 10th, and 12th graders in the USA. See Twenge (2017), Figure 3.4.
Figure 13.1 (bottom) Percentage of thirteen-to eighteen-year-olds experiencing negative thoughts in last twelve months
Monitoring the Future, survey of 8th, 10th, and 12th graders in the USA. See Twenge (2017), Figure 4.5.