Good question, nice answer, but why without happiness?

In their book "How much is enough?" Robert and Edward Skidelsky observe that philosophers and societies have always been critical about greed and insatiability. The pursuit of money and possessions was always subordinated to higher ideals, which were associated with views on ‘the good life’. This subordination led to standards about appropriateness and enoughness. This morality is gone. Dominant economic thinking accepts greed and insatiability as guiding principles. The needs of people are supposed to be unlimited and economic growth is supposed to create more well-being automatically. The Skidelskys reject this theory. They believe this theory has led to a rat-race in rich countries with adverse effects. They present an interesting proposal: let us make a list of things that are necessary for the good life, and together also sufficient. They think of features like health, safety, harmony with nature and leisure. Their list is acceptable, but such lists are always somewhat arbitrary and can easily lead to paternalism. Such dangers are smaller if subjective happiness is added. It is, however, fascinating and reassuring that the specific proposals of the Skidelskys contribute to more individual freedom. A basic income in particular creates more freedom to stay out of the rat-race, or to participate less intensively

Inner wellbeing: concept and validation of a new approach to subjective perceptions of wellbeing-India

© The Author(s) 2013. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.This paper describes the conceptual development of a multi-domain, psychosocial model of 'Inner Wellbeing' (IWB) and assesses the construct validity of the scale designed to measure it. IWB expresses what people think and feel they are able to be and do. Drawing together scholarship in wellbeing and international development it is grounded in field research in marginalised, rural communities in the global South. Results from research in India at two points in time (2011 and 2013) are reported. At Time 1 (n = 287), we were unable to confirm an eight-factor, correlated model as distinct yet interrelated domains. However, at Time 2 (n = 335), we were able to confirm a revised, seven-factor correlated model with economic confidence, agency and participation, social connections, close relationships, physical and mental health, competence and self-worth, and values and meaning (five items per domain) as distinct yet interrelated domains. In particular, at Time 2, a seven-factor, correlated model provided a significantly better fit to the data than did a one-factor model.This work is supported by the Economic and Social Research Council/Department for International Development Joint Scheme for Research on International Development (Poverty Alleviation) grant number RES-167-25-0507 ES/H033769/1. Special thanks are due to Chaupal and Gangaram Paikra, Pritam Das, Usha Kujur, Kanti Minjh, Susanna Siddiqui, and Dinesh Tirkey

Psychological and Environmental Correlates of Well-being Among Undergraduate University Students

This study explored whether the university environment provides similar well-being enhancing elements to those that have been found in the workplace and school contexts. Whether psychological inflexibility accounts for well-being over and above personality and environmental influences was also explored. A representative sample of 163 undergraduate university students in an Australian university completed an online survey measuring the key constructs. Environmental influences assessed included financial resources, physical security, opportunity to use new skills, externally generated goals, variety, environmental clarity, interpersonal contact, and valued social position. Hierarchical multiple linear regression analyses were then conducted to test for predictors of three domains of subjective well-being: positive affect, negative affect, and life satisfaction. The results suggested that university context contributes significantly to undergraduate students’ well-being by providing a valued social role, externally generated goals, and variety. Students’ perception of their physical security was also an important influence on their well-being. These results are consistent with the literature on well-being and employment. Neuroticism significantly predicted negative affect, while psychological inflexibility accounted for unique variance in life satisfaction and negative affect even when personality and environmental influences were taken into account. The implications of these findings for enhancing undergraduate university students’ well-being are discussed

An empirical approach towards the efficient and optimal production of influenza-neutralizing ovine polyclonal antibodies demonstrates that the novel adjuvant CoVaccine HT(TM) is functionally superior to Freund's adjuvant

Passive immunotherapies utilising polyclonal antibodies could have a valuable role in preventing and treating infectious diseases such as influenza, particularly in pandemic situations but also in immunocompromised populations such as the elderly, the chronically immunosuppressed, pregnant women, infants and those with chronic diseases. The aim of this study was to optimise current methods used to generate ovine polyclonal antibodies. Polyclonal antibodies to baculovirus-expressed recombinant influenza haemagglutinin from A/Puerto Rico/8/1934 H1N1 (PR8) were elicited in sheep using various immunisation regimens designed to investigate the priming immunisation route, adjuvant formulation, sheep age, and antigen dose, and to empirically ascertain which combination maximised antibody output. The novel adjuvant CoVaccine HT™ was compared to Freund’s adjuvant which is currently the adjuvant of choice for commercial production of ovine polyclonal Fab therapies. CoVaccine HT™ induced significantly higher titres of functional ovine anti-haemagglutinin IgG than Freund’s adjuvant but with fewer side effects, including reduced site reactions. Polyclonal hyperimmune sheep sera effectively neutralised influenza virus in vitro and, when given before or after influenza virus challenge, prevented the death of infected mice. Neither the age of the sheep nor the route of antigen administration appeared to influence antibody titre. Moreover, reducing the administrated dose of haemagglutinin antigen minimally affected antibody titre. Together, these results suggest a cost effective way of producing high and sustained yields of functional ovine polyclonal antibodies specifically for the prevention and treatment of globally significant diseases.Natalie E. Stevens, Cara K. Fraser, Mohammed Alsharifi, Michael P. Brown, Kerrilyn R. Diener, John D. Haybal

Z' signals in polarised top-antitop final states

We study the sensitivity of top-antitop samples produced at all energy stages of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) to the nature of an underlying Z' boson, in presence of full tree level standard model (SM) background effects and relative interferences. We concentrate on differential mass spectra as well as both spatial and spin asymmetries thereby demonstrating that exploiting combinations of these observables will enable one to distinguish between sequential Z's and those pertaining to Left-Right symmetric models as well as E6 inspired ones, assuming realistic final state reconstruction efficiencies and error estimates.Comment: 21 pages, 6 colour figures, 10 table

The ethics of digital well-being: a multidisciplinary perspective

This chapter serves as an introduction to the edited collection of the same name, which includes chapters that explore digital well-being from a range of disciplinary perspectives, including philosophy, psychology, economics, health care, and education. The purpose of this introductory chapter is to provide a short primer on the different disciplinary approaches to the study of well-being. To supplement this primer, we also invited key experts from several disciplines—philosophy, psychology, public policy, and health care—to share their thoughts on what they believe are the most important open questions and ethical issues for the multi-disciplinary study of digital well-being. We also introduce and discuss several themes that we believe will be fundamental to the ongoing study of digital well-being: digital gratitude, automated interventions, and sustainable co-well-being

Life is Getting Better: Societal Evolution and Fit with Human Nature

Human society has changed much over the last centuries and this process of ‘modernization’ has profoundly affected the lives of individuals; currently we live quite different lives from those forefathers lived only five generations ago. There is difference of opinion as to whether we live better now than before and consequently there is also disagreement as to whether we should continue modernizing or rather try to slow the process down. Quality-of-life in a society can be measured by how long and happy its inhabitants live. Using these indicators I assess whether societal modernization has made life better or worse. Firstly I examine findings of present day survey research. I start with a cross-sectional analysis of 143 nations in the years 2000–2008 and find that people live longer and happier in today’s most modern societies. Secondly I examine trends in modern nations over the last decade and find that happiness and longevity have increased in most cases. Thirdly I consider the long-term and review findings from historical anthropology, which show that we lived better in the early hunter-gatherer society than in the later agrarian society. Together these data suggest that societal evolution has worked out differently for the quality of human life, first negatively, in the change from a hunter-gatherer existence to agriculture, and next positively, in the more recent transformation from an agrarian to an industrial society. We live now longer and happier than ever before

Children’s discourses of natural spaces: considerations for children’s subjective well-being

Based on the evidence provided in the literature, it is manifest that increased time spent in nature increases various aspects of children’s well-being. Using discourse analysis on focus group interviews with 28 children between the ages of 12 and 14 years old from three socio-economically diverse communities in the Western Cape of South Africa, the study aimed to explore how children construct and assign meaning to natural spaces. More specifically the study explored how children use specific discursive resources and repertoires to construct and assign meaning to their engagement with natural spaces, and the extent to which this influences their subjective well-being. Several pertinent discourses emerged from the participants’ accounts within four themes of: Safety and natural spaces, Appreciation for natural spaces, Degradation of Nature: Thinking environmentally, acting pro-environmentally, and Natural spaces and children’s subjective well-being. The study highlights the critical role that children’s engagement in natural spaces has on their subjective well-being, and how these benefits can be harnessed to better children’s overall quality of life.IS

Notions of Well-Being, the State of Child Well-Being Research and the MYWEB Project

There has been a growing interest among academics, policy makers and practitioners in the subjective well-being of children and young people (CYP). The recognition of CYP’s rights to having a good childhood and good future life chances, coupled with the injunction from the New Sociology of Childhood to consult with CYP as active agents have resulted in an increasing number of studies on children and young people’s well-being at national and international levels. However, the design, content, and modes of data collection used in these surveys are influenced by the question of the extent to which the researchers view children and young people as similar or different to adults and which participatory models they are undertaking for the young people in the study. However, the design, content, and modes of data collection used in these surveys are influenced by a number of factors including conceptual underpinning of well-being, its measurement and participatory model(s) used by the researchers for children in those surveys. This chapter reviews these aspects before describing the structure of this book with summaries of each subsequent chapter

Spanish Validation of the Flourishing Scale in the General Population

Well-being research and its measurement have grown in the last two decades. The objective of this study was to adapt and validate the Flourishing Scale in a sample of Spanish adults. This was a cross-sectional study using a non-probabilistic sample of 999 Spanish general adult population participants. The psychometric properties of the scale were analysed from an exploratory and confirmatory perspective. Exploratory factor analysis showed a one-factor solution explaining 42.3% of the variance; an internal consistency of .846; temporal reliability correlation of .749; convergent validity with the Satisfaction with Life Scale of .521 and criterion validity with positive and negative affect (PANAS), pessimism and optimism (LOT-R) ranging from .270 to .488. Confirmatory factor analysis testing the one-factor solution showed a χ2 of 65.57 df = 20; CFI of .982, RMSEA of .06, average variance extracted index of .518 and composite reliability index of .841. Results showed that the Spanish version of the FS is a reliable and valid method for measuring high levels of well-bein