Introduction to a Culturally Sensitive Measure of Well-Being: Combining Life Satisfaction and Interdependent Happiness Across 49 Different Cultures

How can one conclude that well-being is higher in country A than country B, when well-being is being measured according to the way people in country A think about well-being? We address this issue by proposing a new culturally sensitive method to comparing societal levels of well-being. We support our reasoning with data on life satisfaction and interdependent happiness focusing on individual and family, collected mostly from students, across forty-nine countries. We demonstrate that the relative idealization of the two types of well-being varies across cultural contexts and are associated with culturally different models of selfhood. Furthermore, we show that rankings of societal well-being based on life satisfaction tend to underestimate the contribution from interdependent happiness. We introduce a new culturally sensitive method for calculating societal well-being, and examine its construct validity by testing for associations with the experience of emotions and with individualism-collectivism. This new culturally sensitive approach represents a slight, yet important improvement in measuring well-being

Multiple Social Identities in Relation to Self-Esteem of Adolescents in Post-communist Albania, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Kosovo, and Romania

We test a model linking ethnic, familial, and religious identity to self-esteem among youth in Albania, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Kosovo, and Romania. All countries are post-communist nations in Europe, offering novel and underexplored settings to study identity. Participants were 880 adolescents (mean age, 15.93 years; SD, 1.40) with Albanian (n = 209), Bulgarian (n = 146), Czech (n = 306), Kosovan (n = 116), and Romanian (n = 103) background who filled in an Ethnic Identity Scale (Dimitrova et al., 2016), familial and religious identity scales adapted from the Utrecht Management of Identity Commitment Scales [U-MICS; Crocetti et al. Child and Youth Care Forum, 40, 7–23 (2011); Crocetti et al. Assessment, 1, 2–16 (2015)], and the Rosenberg’s Self-Esteem Scale [Rosenberg, Conceiving the self. Basic Books, New York (1979)]. A multigroup path model showed that ethnic, familial, and religious identities were significantly positively related to a single underlying construct of social identities. In all countries, youth with a stronger multiple identities reported higher self-esteem. These results are particularly valuable in addressing the scope of the proposed book by providing new knowledge on multiple social identities among under investigated samples from post-communist countries in Europe faced with dynamic societal changes. They also mirror increasing attention on multiple, inclusive, and intersectional identities as psychological assets for young generations

Identity resources for positive adaptation of Roma ethnic minority youth in Albania, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Italy, Kosovo, and Romania

This chapter investigated ethnic and national identity and well-being in terms of self-esteem in Roma adolescents across six European countries by testing potential hypothesized mean levels and associations

Understanding factors affecting well-being of marginalized populations in different cultural contexts: Ethnic and national identity of Roma minority youth in Europe

This chapter focuses on the intersection of the third, fourth and tenth Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), referring together to key pillars for improving social inclusion of vulnerable disadvantaged youth. Based on both Positive Youth Development approach and mutual intercultural relations perspective, it sets out to investigate developmental assets (such as ethnic and national identities), optimal outcomes (self-esteem), and their relations among Roma youth in six European countries (Albania, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Italy, Kosovo, and Romania). Among these countries, the Czech Republic was initially recognized as the more favorable context facilitating potential alignment of Roma young people’s ecology with their identity resources, and therefore, promoting well-being. Results supported that in the Czech Republic youth experienced more stable integration of both Roma ethnic and national identities in terms of similar mean levels as well as positive associations of both identities with self-esteem. Results for the other countries were quite fragmented depending on the specific contextual conditions. The findings are discussed in light of the SDGs, the theoretical frameworks, research contexts and limitations, and implications

National collective identity in transitional societies: Salience and relations to life satisfaction for youth in South Africa, Albania, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Kosovo and Romania

In this study we investigated the salience of the construct of national collective identity and its associations with life satisfaction among adolescents living in transitional societies characterised by relevant change in the last decades . Participants were 1 066 adolescents (M = 15 .35 years, SD = 1 .35) from South Africa (n = 186) and five Central Eastern European countries, including Albania (n = 209), Bulgaria (n = 146), Czech Republic (n = 306), Kosovo (n = 116), and Romania (n = 103) . They completed a questionnaire including national identity and life satisfaction scales . Data were analysed using confirmatory factor analysis and multi-group structural equation modeling . Results showed that national identity of adolescents in transitional societies is multidimensional and pertains to different salient dimensions (i .e ., self-categorisation, evaluation, importance, attachment, and behavioural involvement) . Importantly, the findings provided evidence to suggest that higher levels of national collective identity are associated with increased levels of life satisfaction