In the World Happiness Rankings 2023, Finland was declared the happiest nation for the fifth year in a row, followed by Denmark, Iceland, Israel and Netherlands. China was placed at 64, Nepal at 78, Iraq at 98, Pakistan at 108, Sri Lanka at 112, Bangladesh at 118 and India at 126 out of 137 nations. The rankings use a universal measuring tool (Cantril Ladder) and the parameters are not adjusted according to the prevalent socio-economic and political structure of the countries. The rankings very evidently reflect the global North-South divide, which in turn leads to the fundamental question, can a uniform measuring scale be applied across the globe for measuring happiness and wellbeing? Do happiness and wellbeing have the same meaning globally or are they regionally and culturally diverse?

“Culture refers to the cumulative deposit of knowledge, experience, beliefs, values, attitudes, meanings, hierarchies, religion, notions of time, roles, spatial relations, concepts of the universe, and material objects and possessions acquired by a group of people in the course of generations through individual and group striving.” Culture plays a very important role in the way happiness and wellbeing are perceived by someone. As Ed Diener states, “Philosophers debated the nature of happiness for thousands of years, but scientists have recently discovered that happiness means different things. Three major types of happiness are high life satisfaction, frequent positive feelings, and infrequent negative feelings. “Subjective well-being” is the label given by scientists to the various forms of happiness taken together.” It is this umbrella term Subjective Well Being (SWB) which is being used globally to measure the happiness and wellbeing levels of people. The prime reason for the focus on this concept of SWB, is to provide a more wholesome picture of a nation’s development where economic growth and societal wellbeing are monitored together. Thus, happiness has a new face in SWB, but just like how happiness means different things to different people, SWB can also not be evaluated in isolation. This article is an attempt to explore how a culturally sensitive perception of SWB is extremely important to gauge the happiness and wellbeing levels of a specific population.

“Subjective well-being (SWB) is the personal perception and experience of positive and negative emotional responses and global and (domain) specific cognitive evaluations of satisfaction with life. It has been defined as “a person’s cognitive and affective evaluations of his or her life”. Simply, SWB is the individual evaluation of quality of life (QOL) and therefore converges with the definition of QOL.” The distinctive feature of Subjective Well-being is that it is an individual’s own perception of life satisfaction, positive and negative emotions, which is affected by cultural factors. One factor which plays an important role in the level of SWB is whether the person belongs to an individualistic or collectivist society. “In most fundamental terms, individualism refers to a tendency to preferentially focus on the individual. In cross-cultural research, the notion of individualism is often contrasted with collectivism – i.e., the orientation toward one’s social community… When describing cultural differences, the terms individualism and collectivism are often viewed as diametrically opposite ends of the same dimension.” In individualistic cultures personal freedoms, opinions and expectations are placed at higher standing than familial relationships; where in collectivist cultures the goals and aspirations of the community takes precedence over personal preferences.

Suh and Oishi highlight that extensive empirical research points out that members of individualistic cultures are happier than members of collectivist cultures. A recent 2023 study raises a pertinent question in this regard, “how can one reasonably conclude that country A is happier than country B, when happiness is being measured according to the way people in country A think about happiness?” Developmental reasons aside, this assertion opens the debate regarding the very nature of happiness that the individual is seeking in diverse cultural settings. People in different cultures perceive and pursue wellbeing in different manners. In collectivist cultures like East Asia people are more driven by community standards, interpersonal relationships and social values in their quest for happiness and wellbeing, whereas in individualistic cultures happiness and wellbeing are more inclined towards personal aspirations and goals.

Happiness is also measured differently in different cultures. For instance, in collectivist cultures, self-esteem is irrelevant, despite being regarded in individualistic cultures as a crucial component of happiness. “Diener and Diener, for example, failed to find any significant association between self-esteem and SWB among female college students in India.” Culture also influences how people evaluate their level of life satisfaction. “In two sizable worldwide samples, Suh, Diener, Oishi, and Triandis (1998) discovered exactly this… Individualist cultural members essentially seemed to have adopted the mentality that “if I am feeling good now, it must mean my life is quite satisfying overall.” Collectivists were less likely to follow such reasoning when evaluating their lives. In addition to emotions, collectivist cultural members tend to pay considerable attention to social cues (e.g., whether significant others approve the way they live) during their life satisfaction judgments (Suh & Oishi).”

There are some inherent drawbacks while using the same measuring tool for wellbeing across cultures. The bulk of research on wellebing and happiness has been conducted through a WEIRD lens—a lens of Western, Educated, Industrialised, Rich and Democratic societies. Even though the idea of happiness and wellbeing are deeply rooted within Eastern culture, the same has not been a rallying point in its contemporary literature.  The American Declaration of Independence granted three inalienable rights to its citizens- life, liberty and pursuit of happiness, and though it wasn’t subsequently drafted in the Constitution, it has definitely been a source of constant discussion and debate in the societal setup. However, personal modesty is a fundamental societal virtue in East Asian civilizations like Japan; one should not brag about one’s accomplishment or publicly declare one’s wellbeing. Therefore, it is possible that Americans are simply more inclined to declare their pleasure on a survey form rather than being happier than East Asians.

SWB, as mentioned in the beginning, is a self-evaluation of a person’s satisfaction with their lives, which in view of cultural differences, seems to be more oriented towards a western conception of happiness and wellbeing; which in turn leads to findings where individualistic societies fare better in terms of wellbeing and happiness. The results, however, may vary when cross cultural parameters like interdependent happiness and social harmony are also taken into account while measuring wellbeing. It is evident that different cultures place different levels of importance on well being components, the same needs to reflect in relevant studies so as to ensure that all aspects are included.