engleski

Personal Well-being Index of Croatian citizens 2003-2014

Interest in measuring well-being is increasing in the countries around the world. Recognizing the need for continuously monitoring subjective well-being, alongside with social and economic indicators, systematic research on personal well-being in Croatia has been ongoing since 2003. The aims of this paper are to explore the changes in personal well-being domains within Croatian citizens from 2003 to 2014. The data used for these comparisons were obtained from six surveys (2003, 2005, 2007, 2008, 2011 and 2014) conducted on nationally representative samples of Croatian citizens. Depending on the year, sample sizes varied from N=900 to N=4000 participants. Data was gathered via face-to-face interviews in participant’s home. The measure of well-being used was the Personal Wellbeing Index (PWI ; The International Wellbeing Group, 2006). It is designed to assess the satisfaction with several life domains such as standard of living, achievement in life, personal health, personal relationship, personal safety and community connectedness. Participants were asked to rate their satisfaction with different domains. The Croatian version of this instrument was found to be both valid and reliable for use in population surveys (Kaliterna & Prizmic-Larsen, 2014). The reliability of the PWI scales through the years range from α = .77 to α = .85. While analyzing the rank of satisfaction with life domains within the surveyed years, similar trends replicated across the examined samples. Consistently through the years Croatia citizens were the most satisfied with relationships with family and friends and it has been steadily rated within the range of 70–80% SM found for Western populations. Contrary, Croatia citizens were the least satisfied with standard of living, which was rated as the lowest domain within the range of 60-70% SM typical for the non-Western countries. Analyses of mean level of PWI trends were performed on total PWI index (average score across all personal domains) as well as on each personal life domain calculated for respective year. One year significant increase in the total PWI index (2007) was followed by drop in total PWI index scores to the level of previous year average. Between the 2003 and 2014 the changes in the level of satisfaction with specific domains were observed. Significant declines in satisfaction were observed in domains of personal safety and community connectedness. Other year to year changes were observed in satisfaction with standard of living and achievement in life. The only life domain which stayed unchanged across the surveyed years was satisfaction with health. PWI, as a tool to measure the subjective wellbeing of populations used in six surveys in Croatia, showed utility in identifying the highest and lowest domains that people are satisfied with, as well as monitoring the changes in them through the years.

PWI; age; gender; satisfaction

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