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What Is Well Being

This document discusses definitions of well-being and the challenges involved in defining it. While well-being is often considered important for economic policy, there is no universally accepted definition. The OECD measures well-being as quality of life, but some argue this is a dimension rather than a definition. Authors also often describe dimensions of well-being rather than defining it directly. The document concludes that well-being is a subjective state created by individual life experiences and factors like social, physical, and economic conditions, which vary between individuals and affect one's normal state of well-being.

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85 views3 pages

What Is Well Being

This document discusses definitions of well-being and the challenges involved in defining it. While well-being is often considered important for economic policy, there is no universally accepted definition. The OECD measures well-being as quality of life, but some argue this is a dimension rather than a definition. Authors also often describe dimensions of well-being rather than defining it directly. The document concludes that well-being is a subjective state created by individual life experiences and factors like social, physical, and economic conditions, which vary between individuals and affect one's normal state of well-being.

Uploaded by

Juancarloos
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial No-Derivs (BY-NC-ND)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Juan Carlos Herrera Burbano - Universidad de La Sabana August 2017

What is well-being?
The peoples wellbeing plays and have played an important role in the economic policy (C.
Seaford, 2010,), but how an institution can take care of something which has not had a
general accepted definition1. In this essay, we will try to clarify what is wellbeing,
analyzing the ways in which organizations like OCDE measure wellbeing and examining
definitions given by authors, like Rachel Dodge.
Along the history of humankind most of the people try to answer what wellbeing is through
descriptions or dimension of wellbeing. That is, definitions like ability to fulfil goals
happiness and life satisfaction. (Dodge, R., Daly, A., Huyton, J., & Sanders, L; 2012,
p.223). It is even the problem of researchers2 because they are given a description instead
of a definition of what wellbeing is. It seems be that OCDE has this problem, in one of its
papers called Measuring well-being and progress, we realize that they try to measure
wellbeing as the peoples quality of life, but this is a problem due that quality of life could
be consider a dimension of wellbeing rather than an all embracing definition (Dodge,
R., Daly, A., Huyton, J., & Sanders, L;2012, p.224).
As you can see even the most respected and important institutions have problems in
defining wellbeing, and of course it is a problem because some authors like Shah and
Marks (2004) argue that any democratic government should promote the good life: a
flourishing society, where citizens are happy, healthy, capable and engaged in other
words with high levels of well-being (p. 2). However, when Shah and Marks tried to
define wellbeing they fell into the error of make a description of wellbeing rather than a
definition of it3.
Fortunately to economist, some authors argue that wellbeing is a state (Reber, 1995, p.750)
which involves that wellbeing can be measure. So, we think there are two important
characteristics which defines wellbeing. The first one is that it is a SUBJECTIVE state
which of course everybody have, but nevertheless all (states) are different. In other words,
the individuals wellbeing state depends on factors like socials, physicals, psychologicals,
economicals, spirituals and in general life events (as Rachel Dodge mentioned) which of
course are different to every person; and these factors create and affect a normal state or
equilibrium wellbeing (Headey and Wearing; 1991, p. 57), which is the second
characteristic.
To conclude, wellbeing is a subjective state created by the person life events and affected
for them too.

1
Dodge, R., Daly, A., Huyton, J., & Sanders, L. The challenge of defining wellbeing, p.222.
2
Dodge, R., Daly, A., Huyton, J., & Sanders, L. The challenge of defining wellbeing, p.223.
3
Dodge, R., Daly, A., Huyton, J., & Sanders, L. The challenge of defining wellbeing, p.225.
Bibliography
C, Seaford. (1966), Well-being: human well-being and priorities for economic policy-makers, consultado en:
04 de Julio 2017. Recuperado de: http://b.3cdn.net/nefoundation/10ca56de94701c7fc4_qfm6bhi4r.pdf

Christopher, J. (1999). Situating psychological well-being: Exploring the cultural roots of its theory and
research. Journal of Counselling & Development, 77, 141152. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/j.1556-
6676.1999.tb02434

Dodge, Rachel Daly, Annette P. Huyton, Jan Sanders, Lalage D. (2012), The challenge of defining wellbeing,
condultado en: 04 de Julio 2017. Recuperado de:
https://internationaljournalofwellbeing.org/index.php/ijow/article/viewFile/89/238

Headey, B. W., & Wearing, A. J. (1991). Subjective well-being: a stocks and flows framework. In Strack, F.,
Argyle, M., & Schwarz, N. (Eds.). Subjective Wellbeing An interdisciplinary perspective (pp. 4976).
Oxford: Pergamon Press.

Reber, A. (1995). Dictionary of psychology Second Edition. Harmonsworth: Penguin.

Shah, H., & Marks, N. (2004). A well-being manifesto for a flourishing society. London: The New Economics
Foundation

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