Going beyond the single item: deriving and evaluating a composite subjective wellbeing measure in the Swiss Household Panel
The Swiss Household Panel (SHP) is an invaluable source of knowledge about wellbeing at the population level and its changes over time in Switzerland, allowing for cross-country comparisons. However, researchers using SHP data have been inconsistent in their choice and use of wellbeing indicators, making comparability of findings across studies difficult. With this guide, our aim was to derive an aggregate measure that maximises the SHP’s potential to examine multiple dimensions of wellbeing and examine its validity and reliability. This will help researchers to make more informed decisions when using wellbeing measures in the SHP. This study was theoretically guided by the seminal work of Ed Diener on subjective wellbeing. Due to the availability of the measures over time, we focused on affect (emotional measures) and life satisfaction (cognitive measures). We assessed the factorial structure and internal reliability of the wellbeing indicators available in the SHP and tested their measurement invariance across age groups, periods, gender, questionnaire languages, and survey modes. We demonstrated that combining single items in the SHP can derive a psychometrically robust wellbeing measure.Although an overall score of wellbeing combining all items into one indicator showed satisfactory internal reliability, such a one-dimensional measure should be used with caution, as our findings suggest that wellbeing as it is operationalized using the items available in the SHP is not a unidimensionalconstruct. Instead, we recommend using two subscales that should be analyzed separately: 1) positive affect and life satisfaction, and 2) negative affect. However, caution is needed when age or language groups are compared, as certain items behaved differently across groups. This guide provides a step-by-step approach to developing a wellbeing measure that combines single items from different batteries and rigorously assesses its statistical properties. In this way, it can inform researchers using the SHP data on how to move beyond using separate items to construct a wellbeing measure consisting of two dimensions. Furthermore, bringing more consistency to analyzing wellbeing using the SHP will facilitate comparability and help interpret effect sizes.
The COVID-19 pandemic and wellbeing in Switzerland-worse for young people?
The key objective of our study was to describe the population-average trajectories of wellbeing, spanning the period of 2017-2022, comparing young people with other age groups. Moreover, we aimed to identify subgroups of young people who experienced disproportionate changes in wellbeing. We used longitudinal data from six waves (2017-2022) of the Swiss Household Panel. Participants were at least 14 years old in 2017 and had at least one valid composite measure of wellbeing between 2017 and 2022 (n individuals = 11,224; n observations = 49,032). The data were typically collected with telephone or web interviewing. The age of participants ranged from 14 to 102, with a roughly equal distribution of men (51.1%) and women (48.9%). We conceptualized wellbeing as positive affect and life satisfaction, negative affect, stress and psychosomatic symptoms. We described the trajectories of wellbeing using piecewise growth curve analysis. We included sociodemographic characteristics to further describe wellbeing trajectories across subgroups of young people. These comprised (1) gender, (2) migration status, (3) partnership status, (4) living with parents, (5) education/employment status, (6) household income. Young people (age 14-25) experienced a steady decline in positive affect and life satisfaction throughout the entire period, with the greatest change occurring before the pandemic (2017-2019). The trajectories in this outcome were largely stable in other age groups. Moreover, young individuals showed a more pronounced increase in negative affect, particularly in the pre-pandemic years, compared to older groups. Negative affect increased during the pandemic, followed by a subsequent decline post-pandemic, observed similarly across all age groups. Among young people specifically, the trajectory of stress was similar to the one of negative affect. However, issues such as sleep problems, weakness, weariness, and headaches continued to increase in this population from 2017 to 2022. We also found evidence for a greater increase in negative affect during the pandemic in young women and those not in employment or education. Given the fact that the decline in young people's wellbeing in Switzerland started two years before the pandemic, our study emphasises the importance of consideing their wellbeing within a broader systemic context beyond pandemic-related changes.