Introduction: Quality of Life of Chinese People in a Changing World

Excerpt

The concept of quality of life (QOL) has attracted much research attention of researchers in different disciplines. Using “quality of life” as the search term, computer search conducted in July 2009 showed that there were 7,972 citations in PsycINFO, 6,383 citations in Sociological Abstracts, 766 citations in Social Work Abstracts, 4,151 citations in ERIC, 12,671 citations in MEDLINE, and 12,738 citations in CINAHL. In contrast, using “quality of life” and “Chinese” as search terms, identical search showed that there were 58, 1, 8, 46, 1,018 and 28 citations in PsycINFO, Sociological Abstracts, Social Work Abstracts, ERIC, MEDLINE and CINAHL, respectively. These figures clearly suggest that existing research studies on quality of life are predominantly conducted in the West and there is a strong need to conduct quality of life research in different Chinese communities (Shek et al. 2005b). …