Description
This study concerns the importance of the literal phrasing of the lead question in single item scales for Subjective Well-Being and wishes to contribute to more sensitive measures. In an online scenario-experiment, participants were required to rate Subjective Well-Being (SWB) in a fictive character. SWB was rated on a brief questionnaire consisting of experimentally manipulated phrasings of the lead question of two SWB instruments, using ever the same 11-point rating scale. The questions comprised a conventional question: “When you think about your life and your personal situation, how satisfied are you with your life as a whole?” and a new convenient question: “How are you?”. Both questions were also specified with the timeframes “last week” and “these days”, resulting in 6 phrasings. Participants were 102 volunteering first year BA psychology students. 1) A significant difference between the exact phrasing of the lead questions was found: the new convenient lead question seemed more sensitive than the conventional question. The conventional question probably overly stresses the past, so that recent changes in one’s personal situation may be blurred. 2) Including a timeframe in both lead questions resulted in significantly more sensitivity to a recent change in the personal situation. 3) No significant difference was found between the timeframes.| Period | 15 Oct 2015 → 17 Oct 2015 |
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| Event title | 2015 ISQOLS annual conference |
| Event type | Conference |
| Location | Phoenix, AZ, United States |
| Degree of Recognition | International |