Abstract
This paper aims to test the invariance measures of subjective well-being and some of its determinants using Ghanaian and German data from the WVS (World Value Survey). From the WVS wave-6 data, the following dimensions are selected: religion, social capital, social trust, fear feeling or worry, political activities, personalities, security, economic conditions, and subjective well-being. To test the different types of invariance (configural invariance and metric invariance), MGCFA (Multi-group Confirmatory Factor Analysis) was used. The first result of our modeling was that all dimensions significantly determine subjective well-being in the local model with the German data. In contrast to the Ghanaian data, only the dimensions of political activity and the fear feeling or worries turn out not to be significant in explaining subjective well-being. Second, the configural invariance test revealed that social capital, religion, social trust, fear feelings or worries, and economic conditions are non-equivalent between the two countries. Security, political activities, and subjective well-being satisfy the partial invariance measurement. Only personality traits are fully invariant across the two countries. As a result, a comparison of the determinants of well-being across the two countries is only possible for personality traits (full invariance measurement) and security (partial invariance measurement).
Highlights
Subjective well-being has, in recent years, gained considerable interest in economic and psychological research, in particular
Multigroup Confirmatory Factor Analysis (MGCFA) is based first on estimating the general model with data from the different groups. This results in local models that are in this paper the model with the Ghanaian and German data
The use of MGCFA to test the invariance of constructs between Germany and Ghana showed that there are concepts for which comparison between the two countries is impossible
Summary
Subjective well-being has, in recent years, gained considerable interest in economic and psychological research, in particular. Using econometric models, much empirical research estimated the effects of socio-economic factors on happiness This literature shows that subjective well-being varies with income, age, and marital status, and according to the cultural context. Personal perceptions such as happiness or subjective well-being depend on several sociological factors. Tsai et al (2007) compares happiness in Christian and Buddhist texts and find that in the former it is represented by a high emotion; whereas in the latter, it is thought of as a low positive emotion Given this difference in the conception and measurement of subjective well-being across different cultures, a comparative analysis should first check the equivalence measurement (or the measure of invariance), to avoid biased, erroneous or invalid results. Measurement equivalence is a criterion that describes the property of a measuring instrument to evaluate the same concept in a similar way across different groups (Chen, 2008)
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