Subjective well-being (SWB) is the scientific term for happiness and life
satisfaction—thinking and feeling that your life is going well, not badly. Three major types of
happiness are high life satisfaction, frequent positive feelings, and infrequent negative
feelings (Diener, 1984). Examples of high life satisfaction is “I think my life is great” or “I
am satisfied with my job.” A satisfied life can come from having a good income, being able
to achieve one’s goals or having high-self-esteem. According to the World Happiness Report
2021 (Ortiz-Ospina & Roser) which measures life satisfaction through the Cantril Ladder
(respondents are asked to think of a ladder, with the best possible life for them being a 10,
and the worst possible life being a 0), Malaysia achieved an average score of 5.43 in 2020.
From the World Happiness Reports throughout the years, self-reported life satisfaction
correlates with other measures of well-being—richer and healthier countries tend to have
higher average happiness scores. However, taking into consideration that countries all over
the world have suffered from the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, Malaysia’s score in the
latest happiness report doesn’t look too bad.
Life satisfaction is one of the main dimensions of well-being related to psychological
factors, being essential for a person to adjust to difficult circumstances. Life satisfaction
involves one’s evaluation of one’s life or life accomplishments against some standard (e.g.,
the achievements of significant others). As such, some quality of life (QOL) researchers have
viewed life satisfaction as the cognitive element of subjective well-being. Satisfaction with
one’s life implies a contentment with or acceptance of one’s life circumstances, or the
fulfilment of one’s wants and needs for one’s life as a whole. In essence, life satisfaction is a
subjective assessment of the quality of one’s life.
Out of the many domains involved, a person’s social life or quality of relationship
with the people around them is an important element that contributes to their subjective wellbeing. Seligman (2011) emphasized that we are inherently social animals, and as such, we
seek positive relationships as an end goal—a terminal value. Loneliness is profoundly a
disabling condition among humans, and the pursuit of positive connections with others is a
fundamental human need. Loneliness refers to feeling distressed about the quantity or, more
perhaps more importantly, the quality of one’s social relationships (Peplau & Perlman, 1982).
Loneliness, or subjective social isolation, is defined as a situation experienced by the
participant as one where there is an unpleasant or inadmissible lack of (quality of) certain
relationships. The importance of social perceptions and evaluations of one's personal
relationships is emphasized. Loneliness includes situations where the number of existing
relationships is smaller than desirable or acceptable, as well as situations where the intimacy
wished for has not been realized (De Jong Gierveld, 1989).
Loneliness is associated with a host of psychological difficulties, cognitive
deficiencies, sleeping problems, abnormal physiological function, irregularities in the
neuroendocrine system, and improper immune functioning. Growing evidence suggests that
the simple act of engaging in social interactions makes us happier (Epley & Schroeder, 2014).
Among the short list of widely purported universal basic needs is the need to belong
(Baumeister & Leary, 1995) or the need for relatedness (Ryan & Deci, 2000). People who
meet these needs and feel close to others typically thrive, whereas loneliness and ostracism
are (almost by definition) unpleasant and linked with poor health and maladaptive behaviours
(Holt-Lunstad, Smith, Baker, Harris, & Stephenson, 2015; Williams & Nida, 2011). Over 30
years of accumulated evidence supports the conclusion that having some intimate social
connections is strongly positively related to subjective well-being (SWB).
Due to the recent pandemic which enforced numerous restrictions on daily living such
as social distancing, isolation and home confinement, such restrictions showed impact on
people’s psychosocial health. To investigate what these consequences could be, thirty-five
research organizations from Europe, North-Africa, Western Asia, and the Americas launched
an international online survey in April last year (Ammar et al., 2020). The results shows that
the negative effects on social participation were associated with lower life satisfaction during
the home confinement period. The total score in life satisfaction questionnaires decreased by
16% with more people feeling dissatisfied “during” compared to “before” the confinement
period. In another study to determine the effects of social isolation on well-being and life
satisfaction, Clair and colleagues (2021) surveyed adults from 18 to 84 years of age and
found that perceived social isolation was associated with poor life satisfaction.
For this assignment, I decided to investigate life satisfaction and perceived loneliness.
The scales used are Satisfaction with Life Scale and De Jong Gierveld Loneliness Scale. The
Malay version of both scales were administered electronically through Google Form and
distributed to five respondents.
Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS)
The Satisfaction with Life Scale is a 5-item scale designed to measure global
cognitive judgments of one’s life satisfaction. Participants indicate how much they agree or
disagree with each of the 5 items using a 7-point scale that ranges from 7 strongly agree to 1
strongly disagree. The SWLS is shown to be a valid and reliable measure of life satisfaction,
suited for use with a wide range of age groups and applications (Pavot & Diener, 1993).
Normative data are presented for the scale, which shows good convergent validity with other
scales and with other types of assessments of subjective well-being. Life satisfaction as
assessed by the SWLS shows a degree of temporal stability (e.g., .54 for 4 years), yet the
SWLS has shown sufficient sensitivity to be potentially valuable to detect change in life
satisfaction during the course of clinical intervention. The internal consistency of SWLS was
generally higher than the value of .80 (Vassar, 2007). Further, the scale shows discriminant
validity from emotional well-being measures. The SWLS is recommended as a complement
to scales that focus on psychopathology or emotional well-being because it assesses an
individuals' conscious evaluative judgment of his or her life by using the person's own
criteria.
Scores are calculated by summing up the scores of each item. The higher the score,
the more the participant is satisfied with life. Cut-off scores were given to be used as
benchmarks as follow:
Table 1: Cut-off scores for Life with Satisfaction Scale
Skor
Kepuasan dengan Kehidupan
31-35
Sangat puas
26-30
Puas
21-25
Sedikit puas
20
Neutral
15-19
Sedikit tidak puas
10-14
Tidak puas
5-9
Sangat tidak puas
Source: Pavot & Diener, 1993
The Malay version of the Satisfaction with Life Scale used in this assignment was
taken from the translation done by Swami and Chamorro-Premuzic (2009). The Malay SWLS
was tested on a community sample of 816 Malay and 738 Chinese participants in Malaysia.
The results showed that the Malay SWLS had good internal consistency (Cronbach α = 0.83)
with confirmatory factor analysis supporting a uni-dimensional factor structure of SWLS,
which remained invariant across gender and ethnic groups of the general population. The
results suggested that the Malay SWLS is a valid and reliable measure of life-satisfaction for
Malay-speaking samples. Another study was conducted to test the validity of the Malay
version in a sample of clinical outpatients in Malaysia (Aishvarya et al., 2014). The internal
consistency of the SWLS (α = 0.86) was found to be high. Correlational analyses showed that
SWLS had adequate concurrent validity. Scores on SWLS, which differentiated psychiatric
patients and medical patients, supported criterion validity. The logistic regression analyses
showed good discriminative validity of SWLS. The results suggested that the SWLS is a
reliable and valid instrument to measure the satisfaction with life among psychiatry and
clinical outpatients in Malaysia as well.
The Malay version of the Satisfaction with Life Scale used in this assignment can be
found in Appendix 1.
6- Item De Jong Gierveld Loneliness Scale
The De Jong Gierveld Loneliness Scale was developed by De Jong Gierveld and
colleagues in 1985. The scale was developed based on the cognitive approach to loneliness.
In this approach, loneliness is viewed as a subjective experience, and it is not directly related
to situational factors. The De Jong Gierveld Loneliness Scale (DJGLS) is a widely used
measure of loneliness, which assesses social and emotional loneliness in two subscales. The
DJGLS is a self‐administered questionnaire available as an 11‐item measure. The DJGLS
was originally developed in Dutch, and versions of it have already been validated for use in
several languages: English, Danish, Italian, Spanish, Hebrew and Polish. Although the 11item De Jong Gierveld Loneliness Scale proved to be a valid and reliable measurement
instrument for overall, emotional, and social loneliness, its length has sometimes rendered it
difficult to use in large surveys Therefore, it was shortened to a 6‐item measure (Gierveld &
Tilburg, 2006) which consists of 3 items for the emotional and social subscale respectively.
The α-coefficients for the 6-item loneliness scale varied between .70 and.76 for the total adult
population, indicating quite a reliable scale. Confirmatory factor analysis indicated the 3-item
emotional loneliness and the 3-item social loneliness subscales to be two dimensions of the
overarching loneliness concept. For the overall 6-item loneliness scale and for the two
subscales, the reliability coefficients indicate that the scales are quite good in terms of
reliability, given the number of items. The validity of the shortened scale is also remarkably
parallel to that of the original scale. Their study has also shown that the 6-item loneliness
scale and the 3-item emotional and social subscales of loneliness are good measuring
instruments for the broad age range of adults (18 to 99 years), as well as for the three age
subgroups investigated: those aged under 45 years, those aged 45 to 64 years, and those aged
65 years and over.
The 6‐item DJGLS comprises an emotional subscale and a social subscale, each
consisting of three items, as shown in the Malay version in Appendix 2. Respondents rate
their responses to statements on a 5‐point Likert scale with options including “yes!” “yes,”
“more or less,” “no,” and “no!” A total score is calculated after subscale responses are
recoded to account for negatively worded items, providing a range of zero (not lonely) to six
(very lonely).