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Social Indicators Research

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16-11-2014

Priming Effects in Measuring Life Satisfaction

Author: Bogdan Voicu

Published in: Social Indicators Research | Issue 3/2015

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Abstract

Life satisfaction, as an indicator of subjective well-being, has received increasing attention in the recent decades. It has become a potential indicator of development, to be used complementary to objective measures. However, no clear consensus exists on the relationship between life satisfaction and satisfaction with the various domains of life as well as on the measurement of life satisfaction. This paper addresses the relationship between overall life satisfaction and domain satisfaction (DS). The objective is to identify potential biases induced by priming effects when measuring DS. Four types of theoretical models, derived from existing literature, are tested in different scenarios. Data from three waves of the European Quality of Life Surveys are analyzed using a structural equation modeling framework to provide empirical evidence. An original experimental design is employed to demonstrate that priming effects cannot be ignored. A comparison of models including priming effects and those ignoring such biases shows that the former is a better fit and has higher propensity to explain the variations in life satisfaction and DS.

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For all the pure-simultaneity models that are non-recursive, the stability indexes are <1. With some caution (see Kline 2006, 59), this means that the estimates can be analyzed as such. When not including priming effects, minimization is unsuccessful, indicating the extremely poor fit of the model.

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Title: Priming Effects in Measuring Life Satisfaction
Author: Bogdan Voicu
Publication date: 16-11-2014
Publisher: Springer Netherlands
Published in: Social Indicators Research / Issue 3/2015
Print ISSN: 0303-8300
Electronic ISSN: 1573-0921
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-014-0818-0

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