the adoption of innovation. In December 2019, the UK Financial Reporting Council published an updated version of its Code of Governance for Institutional Investors and their Advisors, setting out the highest requirements for responsible governance. It states very clearly that the purpose of governance should be "to create long-term value for clients and beneficiaries, leading to sustainable benefits for the economy, the environment and society" [65]. In Russia, few top managers know about these standards, but practically nothing is known to executives, though for economy they are a basis of attraction of investors, and for employees they have huge humanitarian value, including in finding meanings and purposes of development in labor activity, gaining of reliable basis for SW, and happiness in labor activity in conditions of acceptance of innovations. This new direction of research and management practice certainly needs to be tested, but the prospects seem inspiring.

### **3. Conclusions**

Subjective well-being of personnel is both a humanitarian task of management and a factor of psychological resilience of company personnel, which manifests itself in the involvement of personnel in the innovative development of companies in turbulent conditions of external and internal environment. Subjective well-being has functions of increasing trust to management and emotional regulator of personnel's acceptance of innovations. The formation of subjective well-being as an interactive social action takes place in the context of its systemic determination by the culture of society, organizational culture, personality, and organism. The key determinant of SW is the company's OC, which is an intermediary between the influences of the culture of society and the requirements of management, solving the problems of innovative development, a carrier and translator of innovative values and their corresponding behavior patterns, a factor of organizational stress prevention.

Innovativeness in itself is a factor of SW if it is realized in the model of OC, having a pronounced adhocracy component, and in the corresponding management practices. In this case values of development, model of administrative interaction realized by management, and supporting labor and educational efforts of employees, can be a basis of formation of viable culture.

Personnel security is provided by five basic directions of work of management. The first is associated with the necessary changes in the organizational culture of the company in the direction of achieving the goals of innovative development and is based not only on the value of innovation, but also the value of employees as human capital of the company. If the value of the employee is not the true value of management, it is impossible to implement management practices that provide value reorientation and a new value commitment of staff, and the organizational situation continues to preserve the value conflict and confrontation between management and the rest of the staff. The second direction is manifested in the work to reduce or even remove the psychological costs of innovation. The third is in the supportive style of managerial interaction, which is established by management up to service leadership and ensures that employees trust managers as sources of help in solving complex problems. Fourth, the prevention of stress of innovation, which is realized in the anticipation of changes and preliminary preparation for them on the basis of wide informing the staff about the upcoming changes and the guarantee of preparation for them. And the last, positive reinforcement in terms of behavioral psychology. The problem is that they are usually available to all employees, regardless of the attitude

*Subjective Well-Being at the Workplace as a Social Action: Opportunities for Management… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.106595*

to innovative change, regardless of productivity and quality of work. This approach demotivates the adherents of innovation and creates opportunities to retain personnel focused on minimizing efforts to achieve organizational goals. In this case, programs become a cost, not an investment, and frustrate management. The serious restrictions in realization of these directions can be the generalized approach to the personnel as having general characteristics without taking into account different readiness of employees to accept innovations, adherence to strengthening of a clannish component of OK, desired by the most part of the personnel, absence of competence in realization of supporting and service management interaction.

A separate, not used yet, resource of creation of SW and happiness in labor activity can be meaningful development of the personnel, creating an essential impulse of activity in the direction of increase of innovativeness in labor. It seems that use of this resource will give the effects beyond labor activity. The transition to the meaningfulness of innovative labor, from the meanings of the known world to the meaningfulness of a more complex world and itself in it, in the movement to the unknown, the loss of anxiety and fear of the new, will certainly be important in other areas of human practice and in the education of new generations, already more ready to search for meanings and happiness.

# **Author details**

Lyudmila Zakharova, Zaretkhan Saralieva and Irina Leonova\* National Research Lobachevsky State University of Nizhny Novgorod, Nizhny Novgorod, Russia

\*Address all correspondence to<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
© 2022 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. Distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution - NonCommercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits use, distribution and reproduction for non-commercial purposes, provided the original is properly cited.

# **References**

[1] Myers DG. The Pursuit of Happiness: Discovering the Pathway to Fulfillment, Well-Being, and Enduring Personal Joy. New York: Avon Books; 1992. p. 336

[2] Diener E, Suh EM, Lucas RE, Smith HL. Subjective well-being: three decades of progress. Psychological Bulletin. 1999;**125**(2):276-302. DOI:10.1037/0033-29<IP_ADDRESS>6

[3] Tasic J, Amir S, Tan J, Khader M. A multilevel framework to enhance organizational resilience. Journal of Risk Research. 2020;**23**(6):713-738. DOI: 10.1080/13669877.2019.1617340

[4] Sutcliffe KM, Vogus TJ. Organizing Resilience. In: Cameron KS, Dutton JE, Quinn RE, editors. Positive Organizational Scholarship: Foundation of a New Discipline. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers; 2003. pp. 94-110

[5] McAslan A. Organizational Resilience. Understanding the Concept and its Application. Torrens Resilience Institute; 2010. Available from: https://www. flinders.edu.au/content/dam/documents/ research/torrens-resilience-institute/ organisational-resilience.pdf

[6] Schwab K. The Fourth Industrial Revolution. New York: Crown Publishing Group; 2017. p. 192

[7] Kergroach S. Industry 4.0: New Challenges and Opportunities for the Labour Market. Foresight and STI. Governance. 2017;**11**(4):6-8. DOI: 10.17323/2500-2597.2<IP_ADDRESS>

[8] Fossen F, Sorgner A. Mapping the future of occupations: transformative and destructive effects of new digital technologies on jobs. Foresight and STI Governance. 2019;**13**(2):10-18. DOI: 10.17323/2500-2597.2<IP_ADDRESS>

[9] Kornadt AE. Do age stereotypes as social role expectations for older adults influence personality development? Journal of Research in Personality. 2016;**60**:51-55. DOI: 10.1016/j.jrp.2015.11.005

[10] Posthuma RA. Age stereotypes in the workplace: common stereotypes, moderators, and future research directions. Journal of Management. 2009;**35**(1):158-188. DOI: 10.1177/0149206308318617

[11] Zaniboni S, Kmicinska M, Truxillo DM, Kahn K, Paladino MP, Fraccaroli F. Will you still hire me when I am over 50? The effects of implicit and explicit age stereotyping on resume evaluations. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. 2019;**28**(4):453-467. DOI: 10.1080/1359432X.2019.1600506

[12] Dutta S, Leyn LR, Wunsch-Vincent S, editors. Global Innovation Index 2021. Cornell SC Johnson College of Business; 2021. Available from: https://www. wipo.int/edocs/pubdocs/en/wipo\_pub\_ gii\_2021.pdf

[13] National Project "Labor productivity". Website of the Ministry of Economic Development of the Russian Federation. 2021. Available from: https://www.economy.gov.ru/ material/directions/nacionalnyy\_proekt\_ proizvoditelnost\_truda/

[14] Jeanne C, Meister JC, Brown H. 21 HR Jobs of the Future. Harvard Business Review. 2020. Available from: https://hbr. org/2020/08/21-hr-jobs-of-the-future

[15] Davos Manifesto 2020: The Universal Purpose of a Company in the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Available from: https://www.weforum.org/ agenda/2019/12/

*Subjective Well-Being at the Workplace as a Social Action: Opportunities for Management… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.106595*

[16] Organizational Resilience Index Report 2021. Website of The British Standards Institution (BSI). Available from: https://www.bsigroup.com/en-GB/ our-services/Organizational-Resilience/ Organizational-Resilience-Index/

[17] Herzberg F. Work and Natura of Man. Cleavland, Ohio: World Publishing Company; 1966. p. 203

[18] Cousins R, MacKay CJ, Clarke SD, Kelly C, Kelly PJ, McCaig RH. Management Standards' work-related stress in the UK: practical development. Work & Stress. 2004;**18**(2):113-136. DOI: 10.1080/02678370410001734322

[19] Lohr KD. Tapping autobiographical narratives to illuminate resilience: A transformative learning tool for adult educators. Educational Gerontology. 2018;**44**(2-3):163-170. DOI: 10.1080/03601277.2018.1432529

[20] Arapovic-Johansson B, Wåhlin C, Hagberg J, Kwak L, Björklund C, Jensen I. Participatory work place intervention for stress prevention in primary health care. A randomized controlled trial. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. 2018;**27**(2):219-234. DOI: 10.1080/1359432X.2018.1431883

[21] Von Thiele Schwarz U, Nielsen K, Edwards K, Hasson H, Ipsen C, Savage C, et al. How to design, implement and evaluate organizational interventions for maximum impact: the Sigtuna Principles. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. 2021;**30**(3):415-427. DOI: 10.1080/1359432X.2020.1803960

[22] Waterman AS. Two conceptions of happiness: Contrasts of personal expressiveness (eudaimonia) and hedonic enjoyment. Journal of Personality and Social

Psychology. 1993;**64**:678-691. DOI: 10.1037/0022-35<IP_ADDRESS>8

[23] Charalampous M, Grant CA, Tramontano C, Michailidis E. (2019). Systematically reviewing remote E-workers' well-being at work: a multidimensional approach. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. 2019;**28**(1):51-73. DOI: 10.1080/1359432x.2018.1541886

[24] Linley PA, Maltby J, Wood AM, Osborne G, Hurling R. Measuring Happiness: the higher order factor structure of subjective and psychological well-being measures. Personality and Individual Differences. 2009;**47**:878-884. DOI: 10.1016/j.paid.2009.07.010

[25] Bocharova E. Subjective well-being of the person of view theoretical of psychology. European Social Science Journal. 2012;**18**(2):235-241

[26] Wirtz N, Rigotty T. When grandiose meets vulnerable: narcissism and well-being in the organizational context. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. 2020;**29**(4):556-569. DOI: 10.1080/1359432X.2020.1731474

[27] Neumeier LM, Brook L, Ditchburn G, Sckoke P. Delivering your daily dose of well-being to the workplace: a randomized controlled trial of an online well-being programme for employees. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. 2017;**26**(4):555-573. DOI: 10.1080/1359432X.2017.1320281

[28] Maslow AH. Motivation and Personality. 3rd ed. New York: Harper Collins; 1987. p. 336

[29] Leontiev AN. Activity. In: Consciousness. Personality. Moscow: Politizdat; 1977. p. 304

[30] Lomov BF. Methodological and Theoretical Problems of Psychology. Moscow: Nauka; 1984. p. 445

[31] Warr P, Bindl UR, Sharon K, Parker SK, Inceoglu I. Four-quadrant investigation of job-related affects and behaviours. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. 2014;**23**(3):342-363. DOI: 10.1080/1359432X.2012.744449

[32] Van Tongeren DR, Burnette JL. Do you believe happiness can change? An investigation of the relationship between happiness mindsets, wellbeing, and satisfaction. The Journal of Positive Psychology. 2018;**13**(2):101-109. DOI: 10.1080/17439760.2016.1257050

[33] Martela F, Steger MF. (2016) The three meanings of meaning in life: Distinguishing coherence, purpose, and significance. The Journal of Positive Psychology. 2016;**11**(5):531-545. DOI: 10.1080/17439760.2015.1137623

[34] Dwyer RJ, Elizabeth W, Dunn EW, Hershfield HE. Cousins or conjoined twins: how different are meaning and happiness in everyday life? Comprehensive Results in Social Psychology. 2017;**2**(2-3):199-215. DOI: 10.1080/23743603.2017.1376580

[35] Hunter C. Happy objects at work: the circulation of happiness, culture and organization. Culture and Organization. 2022;**28**(2):129-147. DOI: 10.1080/14759551.2021.2001818

[36] Parsons T. Actor, Situation and Normative Patterns: An Essay in the Theory of Social Action. Vol. 2. Münster: LIT; 2010

[37] World Values Survey Wave 7 (2017-2020). Russian Federation. Results by Sex and Age. Study/ WVS-2017. P. 15-17. Available from: https://www.worldvaluessurvey.org/ WVSDocumentationWV7.jsp

[38] Magun VS, Rudnev MG. Value consensus and Value differentiation in Russia and other European countries. The Russian Public Opinion Herald. Data. Analyses. Discussions. 2011;**4**:81-96

[39] Magun VS, Rudnev MG. Beyond the Soviet Man: Russians in the European Value Typology. In: The Dismantling of Communism, Thirty Years Later. Moscow: New Literary Review; 2021. pp. 325-353

[40] Hofstede GH. Culture's Consequences: International Differences in Work-Related Values. Sage Publication; 2001. p. 598

[41] Cameron KS, Quinn RE. Diagnosing and Changing Organizational Culture Based on the Competing Values Framework. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass; 2011. p. 259

[42] Grachev AA. Organizational culture and viability of the employee as factors of efficiency of interaction of the organization with VUCA-environment. Institute of Psychology of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Organizational Psychology and Psychology of Labor. 2019;**2**(4):28-43

[43] Zakharova L, Leonova I, Korobeynikova E. Value Conflict and Psychological Resilience of Personnel at Russian Enterprises. Nizhny Novgorod: NSU; 2017. p. 406

[44] Duchek S. Organizational resilience: a capability-based conceptualization. Business Research. 2020;**13**:215-246. DOI: 10.1007/s40685-019-0085-7

[45] Cheetham G, Chivers G. Professional competence: harmonizing reflective practitioner and competence-based approaches. In: O'Reilly D, Lynne CL,

*Subjective Well-Being at the Workplace as a Social Action: Opportunities for Management… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.106595*

Stan LS, editors. Developing the Capable Practitioner. London: Kogan Page; 1999. pp. 215-228

[46] Zakharova L, Leonova I. Socio-Psychological Age of Russian Companies' Personnel. Moscow: INFRA-M; 2021. p. 292

[47] Bray RM, Fairbank JA, Marsden ME. Stress and substance use among military women and men. The American Journal of Drug and Alcohol Abuse. 1999;**25**(2):239- 256. DOI: 10.1081/ADA-100101858

[48] Sutinen R, Kivimäki M, Elovainio M, Forma P. Associations between stress at work and attitudes towards retirement in hospital physicians. Work & Stress. 2005;**19**(2):177-185. DOI: 10.1080/02678370500151760

[49] Kitaev-Smyk LA. Psychology of stress. Psychological anthropology of stress. Moscow: Academic Project; 2009. p. 944

[50] Smoktunowicz E, Cieslak R, Demerouti E. Interrole conflict and self-efficacy to manage work and family demands mediate the relationships of job and family demands with stress in the job and family domains. Anxiety, Stress and Coping. 2017;**30**(5):485-497. DOI: 10.1080/10615806.2017.1329932

[51] Yang S, Yang C, Pei R, Li C, Li X, Huang X, et al. Investigation on the association of occupational stress with risk of polycystic ovary syndrome and mediating effects of HOMA-IR. Gynecological Endocrinology. 2018;**34**(11):961-964. DOI: 10.1080/09513590.2018.1460340

[52] Smith TD, Dejoy DM, Dyal M-A, Huang G. Impact of work pressure, work stress and work–family conflict on firefighter burnout. Archives of Environmental and Occupational Health. 2019;**74**(4):215-222. DOI: 10.1080/19338244.2017.1395789

[53] Jovanović J, Šarac I, Jovanović S, Sokolović D, Govedarović N, Jovanović J. The relationship between occupational stress, health status, and temporary and permanent work disability among security guards in Serbia. International Journal of Occupational Safety and Ergonomics. 2021;**27**(2):425-441. DOI: 10.1080/10803548.2019.1579458

[54] Mauss D, Volmer-Thole M, Herr R, Bosch JA, Fischer JE. Stress at work is associated with intima media thickness in older male employees, independent of other sources of stress perception. Stress. 2021;**24**(4):450-457. DOI: 10.1080/10253890.2020.1812059

[55] Schein EH. Organizational Culture and Leadership. New York: John Wiley & Sons; 2004. p. 336

[56] Zakharova L, Bretones F, Leonova I. Stress, health self-assessment, social and psychological age of women's staff in organizational cultures of different types. Journal of Talent Development and Excellence. 2018;**10**(2):20-36

[57] Zakharova L, Leonova I, Zaladina A, Cherdakova M. Organizational and cultural preferences and subjective wellbeing of female personnel of innovative and ordinary medical companies. Institute of Psychology of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Organizational Psychology and Psychology of Labor. 2021;**2**:47-73. DOI: 10.38098/ipran. opwp\_2021\_19\_2\_003

[58] Kessler RC, Andrews G, Colpe A, Hiripi E, Mroczek DK, Normand SLT, et al. Short screening scales to monitor population prevalence and trends in non-specific psychological distress. Psychological Medicine. 2002;**32**:959- 956. DOI: 10.1017/s0033291702006074

[59] Kuhn MH, McPartland TS. An Empirical investigation of self-attitudes. American Sociological Review. 1954;**19**(1):68-76

[60] Senreich E, Straussner SLA, Steen J. The Work Experiences of Social Workers: Factors Impacting Compassion Satisfaction and Workplace Stress. Journal of Social Service Research. 2020;**46**(1):93-109. DOI: 10.1080/01488376.2018.1528491

[61] Pochebut LG, Chiker VA, Volkova NV, Gurieva SD. Inconsistency of social-psychological effects of organizational social capital consolidation. Organizational Psychology. 2021;**11**(2):8-24

[62] Newstrom WJ, Davis K. Organizational Behavior. Human Behavior at Work. New Delhi: McGraw-Hill; 2007. p. 505

[63] Xanthopoulou D, Arnold B, Bakker AB, Demerouti E, Schaufeli WB. A diary study on the happy worker: How job resources relate to positive emotions and personal resources. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. 2012;**21**(4):489-517. DOI: 10.1080/1359432X.2011.5843

[64] Watson D, Tregaskis O, Gedikli C, Vaughn O, Semkina A. Wellbeing through learning: a systematic review of learning interventions in the workplace and their impact on well-being. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. 2018;**27**(2):247-268. DOI: 10.1080/1359432X.2018.1435529

[65] The UK STEWARDSHIP CODE 2020. Financial Reporting Council [Internet]. 2019. Available from: rc.org. uk/getattachment/5aae591d-d9d3-4cf4- 814a-d14e156a1d87/Stewardship-Code\_ Dec-19-Final-Corrected.pdf. [Accessed: July 1, 2022]

### **Chapter 18**

# (Material) Well-Being in Economics: Beyond GDP

*Marisol Manfredi*

### **Abstract**

This chapter examines the current notion of well-being utilized in the mainstream economics, which is based on the utilitarian philosophy. The analysis focuses on the alternative proposals to expand beyond the existing framework, such as Easterlin's paradox, multidimensional indexes of well-being, capabilities approach, and the cosmovision of the indigenous traditions. The chapter first explores the main definition of happiness and equilibrium of ancient Greek philosophers. Secondly, the chapter investigates the mainstream corpus of Economics with the Utilitarianism as a moral core. Many contradictions and inconsistencies in the implementation of the notion of well-being are unfolded. Thirdly, key proposals to revolutionize the notion are introduced. Given the sociological and environmental problems the Anthropocene has caused, and these ideas could lead to original and inspiring solutions.

**Keywords:** well-being, well-fare, happiness, economics, policy-making, index, GDP, HDI, sustainability, degrowth

### **1. Introduction**

The fact that the endless acquisition of wealth has been hailed as the surest path to happiness does not raise many eyebrows, especially among economists. Usually, if economic growth is a problem, it is because there is not enough of it: the more, the better. The blindness pursuit of economic growth—operacionalized through the Gross Domestic Product (GDP)— aims for the production of goods and services, despite their qualitative characteristics, at large scale, which is "automatically" converted into well-being, and therefore, a "better" country/state.

However, paradoxically, the growth-centered economy made us witness the world changing for the ecological worse with the onslaught on nature reaching an unprecedented intensity, not to mention socio-democratic aspects of it.

Therefore, dismantling the idea of endless material growth as an axiomatic necessity of countries has reached exceptional significance. The beating heart of this change lies in alternative pathways to well-being in Economics, beyond its material aspects, which is the primary concern of this chapter. It is fundamental to question what the word "well-being" implies for current states and policy-makers. All in all, if the well-being of the people is one of the fundamental objectives of every political economy, then it is necessary to unfold what this construct embeds to understand the current state of affairs of our states nowadays.

This chapter is organized as follows. Section 2 introduces the first notion of happiness available in the literature: the concept of eudaimonia by the ancient Greeks philosophers, that it has been completely forgotten inside the mainstream corpus of Economics with the arrival of the Utilitarianism, which is presented in Section 3. Also, this section presented the consequences of using this moral theory as the dominant informational base, leading to the pursuit of growth as a main objective of every state, monitored by the GDP. Finally, Section 4 shows and discusses recent and alternative proposals that expand the notion of material well-being (and the utilitarian philosophy): the Easterlin's paradox, which demonstrates that more income does not imply more happiness; the existence and development of multidimensional indexes of well-being that consider subjective components; the Amartya Sen's capabilities approach that embeds a higher notion including education and health beyond the material; and the cosmovision of Buen Vivir, a Latinamerican indigenous tradition that understands well-being as the harmony with nature.

### **2. Eudaimonia: the base of happiness in ancient Greek Philosophy**

The word "happiness" has been present in the field of Economics since the thoughts of the ancient Greeks. With the concept of *eudaimonia*, they refer to happiness as a balanced state, as a form or art of living, as a lasting and prolonged enjoyment, and not as a mere succession of fleeting and intermittent moments of satisfaction [1]. This art of living was the daily practice of the activities that belong to the soul, that, when doing so, humans experimented the highest state of happiness.

Aristotle distinguished two types of value: value-of-use and value-of-change, a dichotomy later explained entirely by Smith. The former referred to the intrinsic aptitude of a good to satisfy a need, and the latter depended on the relative scarcity or abundance of the good. In other words, the use-value of a precise object consists of its particular contribution to well-being. For example, wine provides food and friendship, two fundamental human needs, so it possesses use-value. Cocaine, on the contrary, which does not provide neither food nor friendship nor any other fundamental component of well-being, does not have use-value. The fact that "I prefer crack to wine does not alter this fact; it simply shows me to have corrupt taste" [2]. This is an important differentiation for understanding the preference satisfaction theory, which asses the value of goods regarding its preference or election, nor its intrinsic addedvalue to fundamental components of well-being. In this sense, crack has more value than wine simply to the fact that the person prefers it. As it can be deducted, this implies dangerous assumptions: is an alcoholic the best judge to asses value to alcohol? For this reason, use-values, as we have seen, should have a controlling end: the good life, and "to pursue them beyond this point should be senseless" [2]. However, this implies to define what it means a good life, an issue solved for Oikonomics,<sup>1</sup> but completely put aside on the discussions of Economics.

According to Aristotle, there were *e*\]*ern*^\_ goods and `a]*ern*^\_ goods, which were respectively divided between goods of the body and goods of the soul. Each one, in

<sup>1</sup> bcd*onomike* is actually the word and science used by the Greeks, from which the modern word and science "Economics" is derived. *Oikonomike* derives from the words "oikos," which means "household" and "nomos," which means the management of resources [2]. In this sense, *Oikonomike* means the art of "household management" and includes activities such as viniculture (an important activity held in the Greek society).

### *(Material) Well-Being in Economics: Beyond GDP DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.108306*

its own way, would help a person to "become happy" or, put differently, contribute to increase well-being. The external goods would grant material well-being (physical goods), the goods of the body would increase well-being of the physique (health and beauty), and the goods of the soul would bring internal well-being. Given this classification, he considered that the only desirable well-being by itself would be the last of the three, the well-being of the soul. It could not be obtained by the simple sum of the first two. Inherent to the reason of the human being, the well-being of the soul became known as *eudaimonia* [1].

*Eudaimonia* is the most valuable well-being and the one that belongs to one's own soul: *eudaimonia is* that characteristic that is particular to human beings. Only activities in accordance with reason, to the peculiar activity of man and woman, is what would lead them to it [3]. In this sense, true well-being is enjoyed naturally, since people cannot control or manipulate it [4]. This complex construct introduced "refer to a state of mind at all, but to an admirable and desirable state of being. It is a matter of public appraisal, not private awareness" [2].

In turn, the Greek philosopher considered that the only way to achieve this state of inner well-being was through the virtuous practice of reason. In other words, choosing what is truly desirable, that is, what reason and not appetite presents as desirable [1], is how one achieves well-being. For this reason, the Aristotelian perspective to well-being is considered as subjective.

However, Aristotle differentiates the concept of ephemeral pleasure with that of eudemonia (a differentiation that has not been made in the subjective approach to well-being of the utilitarianism and preference satisfaction theory). While the ephemeral pleasures are satisfied with external goods and are motivated by appetite, the eudemonia is motivated by reason—as mentioned above, the activity peculiar to humans—and is not sought for the pleasure that its realization entails, but rather because it is desirable by itself [1]. In this regard, reference [2] adds that the good life is not simply one satisfied desire; it indicates the proper goal of desire. And desire is to be cultivated, directed to the truly desirable.

 And the virtues, for Aristotle, are those habits or human activities that humans perform in the different spheres of their lives. The virtuous human will have the desire to perform good and noble actions, those that respond to their desires and that will always be pleasant or "delightful" because the actions adjusted to virtue are delightful for the virtuous and delightful in themselves. In other words, well-being required the various excellences of the intellect, such as courage, moderation, generosity, and wisdom.

However, worth to mention, Aristotle pointed out that some "external goods" (thus material) were necessary to achieve the practice of the virtues inherent to human beings. These essential material goods, according to the Greek philosopher, were considered the universal needs, and according to various authors [2, 3, 6] they were land, housing, clothes, and furniture. In this sense, the "just and temperate person' should accumulate those things in a minimum amount and then stop [2]. In other words, a person should get the external goods of a house, clothes, bed, and shoes and then dedicate their life to develop the internal and spiritual well-being. This is why the Aristotelian proposal is considered not only subjective but also objective. In this sense, it has the advantage of appreciating the inherent complexity of well-being in its external and internal components [1]. As pointed out by [7], there is non-interchangeability in the subjective and objective components of well-being. In this sense, every approach to measure well-being should consider both perspectives.

Finally, this objective approach to well-being implies a fundamental notion inside the thought of ancient Greeks: the limit. They believed that, as well there is a minimum level of external goods necessary to achieve the good life, there should also be an upper limit in this threshold. This limit to the material growth was necessary, and they believe, to not hinder the growth of other kinds, such as the spiritual one. This distinction between material and spiritual was very clear for ancient Greeks: they believed that the limits to economic/material growth should be the satisfaction of the universal/objective needs mentioned before. The excessive material growth without any limit was an obstacle for spiritual progress and will lead to a society of "pigs," in the words of the philosopher Plato. Pursuing material growth, thus, will hinder the progress of reflection, enjoyment, and spiritual growth.<sup>2</sup> This consists of a powerful idea that is lacking in the field of Welfare Economics (see Section below), where "the more is the better." This undermines not only the qualitative distinction between material and spiritual growth but also a just distribution of the material.

# **3. Utility: the definition of happiness in modern economics**

Despite the multidimensionality of the Greek definition of well-being, mainstream normative economics (the field known as Welfare Economics) focuses on well-being as "preference satisfaction" [10], the informational moral base of which is utilitarianism. Revealed-preference theory identifies preferences with choices or hypothetical choices.<sup>3</sup> For orthodox economists, "preferences" and "demand" are sufficient for the purposes of understanding human needs, and therefore there is no need for a deeper discussion in this regard [11]. Reference [12] argues that the notion of well-being<sup>4</sup> for neoclassical welfare-economists cannot be measured directly, and therefore the option is to take what is chosen as evidence. This election explains the "quantity" of well-being people define for the goods, being expressed on how much "they are willing to pay." In this sense, well-being is associated with market choices, serving as a justification to validate the market as a social institution.

<sup>2</sup> Lots of scholars have proposed some sort of nongrowing state for human society [8]. In "the limits of growth," the Club of Rome called equilibrium to that state where population and capital were constant, and where a trade-off between the opposed forces of population and capital achieved a balanced outcome. It is important to point out that this "material" equilibrium of population and capital does not necessarily imply a stagnation of "everything." In the words of John Stuart Mill, "it is scarcely necessary to remark that a stationary condition of capital and population implies no stationary state of human improvement. There would be as much scope as ever for all kinds of mental culture, and moral and social progress; as much room for improving the art of living as much more likelihood of its being improved" [9].

<sup>3</sup> In the early utilitarian thinking, objects had the capacity to bring subjective pleasure or happiness. Later, this was modified to assess desire or fulfillment indicated by the choice of consumers, therefore expressed in market interactions. From this point is that the direct relation between well-being and income was made [11].

<sup>4</sup> For the moment, we are using the words welfare and well-being as synonyms. But actually, the word welfare was developed by the corpus of Welfare Economics, making no distinction between the concepts. Nussbaum & Sen [13] had distinguished these categories. They related the notion of welfare to what people have or possess, whereas the notion of well-being refers to the conditions that are not only tangible but also intangible, since it includes the opportunities, freedoms, and aspirations that the person enjoys. For this reason, Stiglitz et al. [14] recommend recovering the use of the term well-being to detach from welfare and thus be able to use well-being as an appropriate category to measure social progress.

### *(Material) Well-Being in Economics: Beyond GDP DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.108306*

As mentioned before, the concept of utility relies on the normative theory of moral philosophy called Utilitarianism, and it was developed by Bentham in 1789. The term utility within the approach is considered synonymous with pleasure. Goods and actions, from this view, are not considered as useful or instruments with an end, but, on the contrary, they possess the intrinsic capacity of satisfying needs themselves and, in this way, produce well-being [15].

This intrinsic capacity was called utility. This term solved in a simple way the controversial relation between use-value to exchange-value. If use-value is just the utility it brings through consumption, and exchange-value is just the exchange of utilities, then the two terms are just different forms of a single general phenomenon of value. This ingenious application was allowed thank to the (again, mainstream) notion of individual self-interest:<sup>5</sup> the idea of the social good as a collective achievement disappeared. It became a result of individuals pursuing their self-interest in the market. As authors in Ref. [2] argue, the discussion of human beings as what they "really are," rather than as what they "ought to be," was turned into an unassailable fortress of mathematics, logical x-y graphs, and analytics.

According to Sen [16], the requirements of utilitarianism can be divided into three components:

The combination of 1, 2, and 3 is what is known as the classic formula that involves judging each choice based on the total sum of the utilities generated by that decision. And maximization occurs when "the greatest utility for the greatest number of people" is achieved, which attempted to be measured by the "hedonometer" proposal of Edgeworth. The teleological ethic defined by utilitarianism is characterized by understanding what is good regardless of what is just. In this sense, it is considered just as a subordinate concept, only as that which maximizes what is good.

Thus, this philosophical doctrine establishes utility as the barometer to evaluate actions according to whether they maximize pleasure and minimize pain, assigning crucial importance to hedonic experiences [4]. In this way, in contrast to the Aristotelian subjective conception of well-being associated with an art of living, reached by the practice of specific virtues values because there are desirable conditions of being, the utilitarian philosophy is associated with the predominance of sensations of satisfaction and pleasure. The implicit assumption is that individuals

<sup>5</sup> Smith was less parsimonious than his followers about the notion of self-interest. He also developed the notion of "sympathy" in his first book, Theory of Moral Sentiments. But as "economics took shape," this is, as utilitarianism was unified with marginalism, the notion of maximization and its explanation through mathematics was done, and these complexities were ironed out. Also, as a way to consider the economy as an objective, measurable and mathematical science, the social, ethical, moral, and political sides were undermined.

(consumers) have a coherent and rational set of preferences that they reveal in their behavior. It does not matter, from this point of view, whether people are altruists, egoists, hedonists, masochists, or anything else: all that matters is that they have certain preferences and act according to them [2].

This view understands well-being in only one of its dimensions, namely the material. Under this conception, at the macroeconomic level, the higher the Gross Domestic Product (GDP),<sup>6</sup> the greater the flow of goods and services, the greater the economic activity, which translates into greater well-being. In this sense and as its definition stresses, the GDP focuses on only one dimension of the complex concept of well-being, i.e. its monetary component, undermining its multidimensional characteristic [19].

Reference [19] provides a summary of critics to the principles in which orthodox welfare economics rely on. First, the idea that individuals are the best judges of "the correctness" of their preferences or wants—what in [11] is called "the subjective conception of interests"— is not true because people face imperfect information. The range of the things we have access to are constrained by the productive sphere and by the context. In the current state of affairs, it has been augmented by digital and surveillance capitalism that constraints and catalogs our everyday choices. In this regard, Kahneman [20] has demonstrated multiple ways in which people act and decide irrationally, particularly when they face uncertainty

Second, if preferences, tastes, and values are shaped by institutions—such as markets—where individuals take part, then preferences cannot be exogenous to peoples' beliefs and actions, who are part of these institutions. In other words, "what is being evaluated defines the criterion by which it is being evaluated" [21]. The principle of private sovereignty [11], this is, that what is to be produced, how it is to be produced, and how it is to be distributed is determined by the private consumption and work preferences of individuals but falls off to consider the individual's subjective influence on these dynamics. There is no objective standpoint from which to evaluate these preferences, as they constitute outcomes from complex interactions between institutions and the processes of exchanges. How values, power, beliefs, and thus choices are influenced by social institutions or even by the economic exchange itself is not part of the theory.

Third, the imaginary construct of a homo economicus only incentivized by its own self-interest undermines completely the notion of the other. As reference [10] emphasizes, "people are sometimes altruistic and all too often malevolent. People sometimes sacrifice their own well-being to benefit others or to do harm to those they hate." In other words, behavior can also be motivated by concern for others. Neoclassical economics assumes that individuals are autonomous. Furthermore, it assumes that each person is faced with a preexisting "set of choices" that can be hierarchically (and rationally) arranged by them. This objectivity of choices relies on the concept of the rational economic man. As regards this, Max Neef [22] argues that the modern dominant styles of development have tremendous obstacles in making personal development compatible with social development. Both the dynamics of the exercise of power and the effects of exclusionary ideologies tend to dissolve people

<sup>6</sup> GDP is "is the total monetary or market value of all the final goods and services produced within a country's borders in a specific time period," and it was adopted as the main measure of a country's economy since the Kuznets presented it in the Bretton Woods conference in 1944. It is worth noting that Kuznets himself warned that the welfare of a nation can hardly be deduced from the measurement of the GDP [17, 18].

into mass archetypes, or to sacrifice the masses for archetypes of "an individual." The current models, therefore, postpone social development in the name of consumer sovereignty, in circumstances that reduce a person to the mere category of consumer. This can only put limits to personal development.

Fourth, the neoclassical theory of consumption explains that needs, preferences, and desires are unlimited.<sup>7</sup> In this regard, reference [2] argued that this definition on the orthodox corpus of economics had condemned us to scarcity, and not because of a lack of resources, but because of the extravagance of our appetites. It is paradoxical that while the main domain of economics is the study of efficient means to ends, the economist has nothing to say about those ends [2]. There are no limits to satisfaction nor utility, as every consumption of more and different goods only increases it: a larger bundle of goods and services is always preferable to a smaller one. However, are the production and consumption of more guns preferable? Unlike ancient Greeks, orthodox economics presupposes that needs are an open-ended and elastic concept.

Fifth, for mainstream economic analysis, everything is a preference. Both, the wish of a little baby for water and the wish of a homeless person for a secure place for sleeping. As Housman [10] points out, every action is considered a preference; and every preference is measured in the same way, regarding their willingness to pay.

Finally, reference [19] highlights that preference satisfaction theory does not take into account the preferences of future generations. Its intricate nature cannot be revealed through the choices and behavior of present generations, and, as pointed out by ecologists, they are completely undermined.

The conclusion of [19] is that preference satisfaction theory cannot provide a logical, neither ethical nor practical conception and measurement of human wellbeing—especially, on an inter-generational scale. But, as [10] indicates, accepting the connection between preferences and well-being have permitted economists to avoid offering a real and deep philosophical theory of well-being. Or, in the words of Doyal & Gough, while numerous criticisms have been made to the principles of satisfaction theory over the last century, "they still form the normative basis for the inattention paid to the concept of need by neoclassical economics" [11]. For all the mentioned reasons, we consider that this approach is not sustainable, and our science should be focusing on the creation of new tools to analyze the complex human well-being.

Furthermore, this set of limitations can lead to decisions that exacerbate—and in a way justify—injustice and deepen inequality [24]. Therefore, the public information that can be obtained based on the utilitarian metric can thus generate a distortion in the design and elaboration of public policies [1]. In this sense, the organization of the society relies on the private wants of individuals (who are only considered as consumers), and, as Skidelsky & Skidelsky [2] state, the good life is only "a marginal concern, an affair of eccentrics and enthusiasts." The construct of well-being therefore is reduced to a measurable unconditional set of goods. The sources of well-being, its components, and its complex multidimensionality are completely disregarded: "all that matter is whether you have more or less stuff."

For this reason, and in agreement with [22], we believe that to the economic logic—heir to the instrumental reason that permeates modern culture—it is necessary to oppose an ethic of well-being. The fetishism of numbers must be opposed with the notion of human development. Vertical management by the State and the exploitation

<sup>7</sup> The most widespread definition of the Economy in study plans of universities is "a science that allocates limited resources to unlimited needs" [23]. This definition is not questioned, and we will be argued that a deeper study of needs and its supposed unlimitidness is necessary.

of some groups by others must be opposed to the gestation of social wills that aspire to participation, autonomy, and a more equitable use of available resources.

# **4. Recent proposals of innovative conceptualization of happiness**

Despite the dominance of the utilitarian philosophy and its widespread study through Economic study plans around the globe, there has been a series of alternative proposals to expand the notion of well-being, as we will see in the next sections.

However, this direct relationship and the reduction of well-being to a mere monetary dimension has been questioned by scholars and a series of alternative contributions began to proliferate since the 1970s. In this chapter, we will summarize the different contributions and proposals that contribute to its operationalization (a, b) and widen its conceptualization (c, d), as to know:

## **4.1 The relationship between income and well-being: Easterlin Paradox**

There has been a vast literature studying the relationship between income and subjective well-being since the publication of the work of Easterlin [25] from where the notion of Easterlin Paradox was created [27–33]. This author arrived at the empirical conclusion that the increase in a country's income does not necessarily entail an increase in the level of subjective well-being of its inhabitants. His aim was to understand whether there is sufficient empirical evidence to consider that the increase in GDP per capita is an indicator of the improvement in people's wellbeing, understood in terms of happiness [25]. To verify this, the author collected data for 19 countries and reached the following three conclusions, summarized as follows:

1. Within a given country and at a given time, the correlation between income level and happiness exists and is strong;

Since its publication, a series of studies have emerged presenting evidence for or against the paradox. Reference [34] analyzes these investigations and highlights that some authors find a positive and robust relationship between the level of subjective well-being and the product of the countries, proclaiming themselves against the paradox. However, other authors—including Easterlin, McVey, Switek, Sawangfa—argue that this relationship is only robust when comparing countries cross-sectionally, given that the analysis of time evolution yields an opposite result [34].

On the other hand, some researchers defend the existence of the link between income and well-being in those countries whose basic needs have not been met, but alleging that beyond a certain income threshold—satiation point—, this relationship becomes insignificant. For example, Diener and Seligman [35] gathered empirical evidence on countries with average income above 10,000 dollars in annual PPP and tested the correlation between satisfaction with life and GDP. They find that the correlation is insignificant in most of these countries, thus confirming the paradox.

Layard [36, 37] states that income provides well-being in countries with low levels of development, but once the threshold is reached—around USD 10,000 PPP—, the average income level in a country has little or no effect on well-being average subjective. In this way, from certain levels of income, the successive increases in it do not entail substantial increases in the levels of happiness.

There are also Latin-American studies contributing to this discussion. For example, see [38], where authors have proven that life satisfaction that is related to the relational domains (satisfaction with the couple, satisfaction with children, satisfaction with friends, and satisfaction with family) reports greater levels than the income satisfaction. They also point out that health satisfaction and the satisfaction of free time are also important for these societies.

Hence, the Easterlin paradox that bears his name calls into question the relationship that is assumed to be direct between income and happiness for a given country. In addition, it shows that economic growth, operationalized through GDP, is a partial and incomplete indicator of true social welfare. If the increase in income does not guarantee happiness, then there are important policy implications. Reference [6] suggests that the State should promote the factors that positively influence happiness

levels, trying to reduce or eliminate those that negatively influence them. Which are the drivers that boost human well-being is one of the questions this thesis wants to contribute.

# **4.2 The revision of the multidimensional indexes of well-being**

The movement of social indicators was boosted by the creation of the concept of the Human Development Index (HDI) —prepared by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), following Sen's capabilities approach—that it is internationally recognized. The HDI is the most used indicator to make comparisons of international rankings [6]. It arose from an initiative between Mahbuh ul Haq and Amartya Sen and has been calculated since 1990 by the United Nations Development Program [39].

The human development paradigm considers the increase in the range of options, choices, and opportunities among which human beings can choose. Its purpose is the expansion of the range of opportunities that human beings have, understanding as fundamental the following ones: being able to enjoy a healthy and lasting existence, access to knowledge, have sufficient material resources, and have the opportunity to participate in community life [40]. It incorporates three components that contain a total of four indicators: (i) having a long and healthy life—measured life expectancy at birth; (ii) acquiring knowledge—measured by average years of schooling and expected years of schooling; and (iii) enjoying a decent standard of living—measured GDP per capita [41]. Regarding the third component, as we express before, there exist several limitations of this direct relationship. The standardization method used by the HDI is the Linear Scaling Technique (LST), developed in [42]. For the weighting, the method of equi-proportionality is used, that is, equal weight is given to the three dimensions. This decision is based on the normative assumption of equality in the dimensions, that is, it considers that all human beings value the three dimensions equally.

It is a merely objective index, which ignores the categories that the subjects themselves make about their situation and, therefore, only offers a partial view of well-being. In this sense, even though this has constituted an advance, the index falls to incorporate the subjective dimension of well-being that, as we will argue, it is fundamental when building the concept of well-being [42, 43]. Manfredi & Actis Di Pasquale [7] had incorporated subjective indicators to the components of income, health, and education of the IDH, developing an index called "Integral HDI" (HDIi) and showing there is non-interchangeability of these dimensions, pointing out the necessity to incorporate the subjective measures and therefore criticizing the use of HDI as a replacement of GDP. In fact, and not by surprise, the ranking of HDI does not present big differences to the raking provided by the GDP.

However, the importance of the HDI cannot be understated: it has boosted the creation of multiple proposals of multidimensional indicators across the globe that, even their limitations, has broadened the spectrum to study the construct. Since then, it has been accepted that well-being is composed of more than one component, the monetary. On the one hand, the HDI proposes a multicomponent but objective perspective to measure well-being, whereas, on the other hand, indicators just as Life Satisfaction measures only the subjective part. However, there have been developed multidimensional and multi component indexes across the globe. Among them the different proposals of indexes we can mention: Social Progress Index (SPI), Prosperity Index (PI), World Happiness Report (WHR), Happy Planet Index (HPI), and the Integral Human Development Index (IDHi).

### *(Material) Well-Being in Economics: Beyond GDP DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.108306*

A deep study of each of the indexes is not going to be provided in this thesis because it is not the aim of it. A table summarizing the different components (and the specification if they take them in their subjective or objective perspective) and indicator each one uses is provided here in order to show the acceptance on the use of both dimensions and multiple components (**Table 1**).

The HDI is the only indicator that only uses an objective perspective. The other proposals use a bidimensional perspective, showing the general acceptance of their non-interchangeability. However, they do not combine objective and subjective indicators for all the components they embed, except from the Integral Human Development Index (HDIi). The decision to include a brief summary of these indexes (and not include new ones, as these proposals are still proliferating) is to point out just the conclusion that comes out after their analysis:<sup>8</sup> These proposals come mainly from developed nations, in which the values, traditions, culture, socioeconomic, and geographic realities are not taken into account. In [6], the rankings—the outcomes of each one of these indicators—for the Latin-American countries differ substantially, as the correlations of Tau B Kendall and Rho Spearman resulted in very low coefficients. This dispersion of results raises doubts about the reliability of these rankings: is their use appropriate? Which indicator is better? Why do they ponder the components in this way? Does a researcher in England understand "business opportunities" in the same manner as in Bolivia? Moreover, the notion of social ties, or importance of the family, or personal rights, do they make the same sense for Latin American countries? Most of the proposals came from international institutions located in the Global North, where the fundamental components of well-being might be different, as they depend on the values and culture of each society. The conclusion of [6], stressed in [7], is what we want to stress in this subsection: the importance of building well-being policies (rather than indicators) regionally, locally. The idea of creating an homogenous universal measure of well-being in order to compare (and I may ask, compare for what?) would lead us to commit the same mistake—the blindly and restlessly pursuing of the increment of an indicator that we believe can be used as a proxy of well-being. This notion implies that policy makers should focus on regional variables in order to create their own well-being policies and measurements.

### *4.2.1 A note on the notion of Gross National Happiness (GNH): Bhutan*

An index that has embedded the need for regional well-being is the so-called Gross National Happiness (GNH) of Bhutan. This concept was proposed by Jigme Singye Wangchuck, King of Bhutan, in 1974, as opposed to the Gross National Product. It measures quality of life in more holistic and psychological terms than GDP [45] and serves to remind the values lost in the modern world, questioning the purpose and validity of the development of the measurement process, based solely on economic growth. The GNH offers a perspective from nine dimensions, as to know: Subjective well-being, Use of time, Community vitality, Cultural diversity, Ecology, Resilience and pollution, Health, Education, Good governance and Quality of life, involving a total of 33 indicators.

In each of its components, it combines both objective and subjective indicators. It is an index made by and for Bhutanese citizens. It constitutes the first national initiative to define, measure, and monitor the social well-being of a country considering the components according to its own conception, taking into account its values,

<sup>8</sup> A detailed review of each indicator, its conceptualization, and operationalization can be found in [6, 44].

### *Happiness and Wellness - Biopsychosocial and Anthropological Perspectives*

**Table 1.**

*Source: own elaboration.*

*Multidimensional indexes of well-being and its components.*

*(Material) Well-Being in Economics: Beyond GDP DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.108306*

traditions, and culture. In other words, the composition of the index takes into account the reality of the country together with the perceptions and opinions of civil society. And although in Bhutan the well-being of the society is understood as spiritual and not material development, due to its explicitly Buddhist values, it consists of a paradigm shift regarding the measurement of well-being and a proposal to be taken into account.

Kliksberg [46], in his report on Bhutan, asserts that the GNH serves to remind us of the priorities that we have forgotten in the modern world, questioning the notion of happiness and validity in regard to how we measure our progress. He argues that it has come the time to put an end to the misleading calculations of human progress based on economic growth. For progress to be valid, it must have its axis in the citizens, equitably distributed among its inhabitants, and must be socially.

# **4.3 Sen's capability approach**

Sen's capabilities approach marks a paradigm shift in the conceptualization of well-being [47]. The theory of functions and capabilities is presented as an alternative to the utilitarian metric. It is based on the evaluation of well-being and obtaining freedom from a broader point of view of the individual, no longer restricted to their level of income or the goods or resources that they possess or have access to but, rather, what they can do with what they have, that is, what they manage to do or be. Sen departs from a broader and pluralist consequentialism than utilitarianism, whereby he recognizes that freedom and rights are intrinsically important in people's lives [48].

The approach considers that a person's life is a variety of "beings and doings" whose constituent elements are what he calls *functioni*ij*s.* A functioning is an achievement of a person: something that she/he has managed to do or be, and they are integral parts of his state [49]. On the other hand, and linked to this concept, the approach also considers the effective possibility that the person has to perform (or not) the different types of functioning. These are the *cap*kl*ilities*, which represent the alternative combinations of *functioni*ij*s* that a person can do or be while living [50].

The *functioni*ij*s* that can be achieved represent the well-being of a person, and the ability to achieve the *functioni*ij*s* constitute the positive freedom of that person, that is, their real opportunities to obtain well-being and lead a valuable life, giving rise to self-determination [49]. The notion of *functioni*ij*s* offers an overview of what the life of the person is like, which is necessary for them, and this is the right assessment ford judging their freedom and their well-being [51].

Sen has not managed to enunciate in any of his works a complete list of capabilities or *functioni*ij*s*, 9 although he distinguishes, in general terms, between elementary and complex *functioni*ij*s.* The former includes avoiding morbidity and mortality, being adequately nourished, and having mobility. The second ones involve the achievement of self-respect, achievement of self-dignity, social integration, and the possibility to appear in public without shyness and be happy [52]. That is, while the elementals are objective conditions of well-being, the complexes include both objective and subjective aspects.

<sup>9</sup> Marta Nussbaum has advanced a list of 10 central human capabilities, including bodily health and integrity, imagination, thought, practical reason, affiliation, and play. Such capabilities, she and Sen argue, define the space within which quality of life should be assessed [2].

*(Material) Well-Being in Economics: Beyond GDP DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.108306*

Sen distinguishes between different types of evaluative spaces that allow him to value economically and socially a wide variety of information categories: goods, characteristics of goods, *functioni*mn*s* and *ca*o*acities.* To understand them, we will expose the case of riding a bicycle as an example, since it is the most used by Sen [49, 52, 53].

A bicycle, first of all, is a good that has certain properties. However, suppose it only has one: function as a means of transportation (a). Secondly, the effects caused by using the bicycle are varied, in the sense that it can be used for fun, for sport, or because it is the only alternative to get around although a car would be preferred, etc. (b). Thirdly, the bicycle as a good requires that the person that the owner is in physical conditions to be able to ride it, that she/he knows how to ride it and that she/he does not have any disease that does not allow her/him to use it (c).

In this sense, the question is: which of these three aspects (a, b, or c) is the most appropriate to represent the contribution of a bicycle to the well-being of a person? The first aspect (a) fails to assess well-being precisely because the bicycle is simply an object, and the mere possession of an external good is not the same as being able to use and enjoy it. In other words, it is important to distinguish between the good in itself—bicycle—, the activity that it allows—riding a bicycle—and the mental state or satisfaction that entails. On the other hand, if well-being were evaluated taking into account the second aspect (b), only the usefulness of the bike would be evaluated. This pleasure is variable and influenced by individual tastes, fashions, traditions, and culture; therefore, it is not an adequate type of information to capture well-being.

Finally, to capture the real well-being is pertinent to evaluate the activity that the bicycle allows; that is, riding a bike. It is the last aspect (c) that, in fact, demands attention according to this approach. The most appropriate path then is to determine what the person does with the good she/he owns, and in general what she/he manages to do with all the goods that are under her/his control. And this, that is the *functioning,* will vary depending on the person being evaluated, either if it is a child, an elderly person, a sick person, an athlete, or a paralytic [51].

Therefore, *capabilities* are the notion that allows two people to be compared to find out which one has a greater range of opportunities that will allow them to access a higher level of well-being. However, as *capabilities* are potentialities, it is not feasible to measure them or carry out a direct evaluation of them. On the contrary, the *functionings*, as reflected by the achievements, are measurable since they are a constitutive part of the person. In short, the evaluation through the set of capabilities only remains in the theoretical model, while in practice it is the functions achieved that allow measuring well-being (Urquijo Angarita, 2007).

In other words, to assess individual well-being, Sen considers that the resources possessed by the person do not provide enough information since their effective use varies according to personal circumstances, such as age, health, class, education, social capital, and among others. For example, an elderly person will surely need more resources than a young person so that both are equally capable of being healthy; a person with basic knowledge about health and hygiene will be more capable of being healthy, with the same resources, than someone who lacks such knowledge [51]. However, this does not imply that in practice the level of income and access to some basic or essential goods are totally ignored. Even Sen himself in [16] recognizes that if some corrections are made to the monetary variable to account for differences in people's circumstances, income level can be a useful complementary tool in wellbeing assessments. In this sense, Sen's vision coincides with that of Aristotle, since they consider that having access to certain goods is essential to achieve well-being, although it is not sufficient.

In short, the Senian conception of well-being has the advantage of focusing not only on what people do but also on what they can do. In this way, it is a notion that covers both the subjective and objective aspects, since in order to do things, the person needs, on the one hand, access to certain goods. On the other hand, by doing and acting, the person enjoys an inner satisfaction by fulfilling the desires or aspirations that motivated that action. In addition, by holding that the level of well-being depends on the available set of *capacities* to function, it is closely related to the ethical notion of the good life, unlike what happens in the standard economic theories of development and well-being [1]. The notion of what a person can do with what they have is an important advancement in the study of well-being, because it connects the categories in which this is realized: the being, the having, and the doing, which connects this theory with the one developed in [22].

### **4.4 Buen Vivir**

Buen Vivir (in English, loosely translates as "good living" or "well living") has emerged as a political concept in Latin America during the 2000s, but its principles are far older [54], as they belong to the cosmovision of the indigenous communities of South America. One of the main precursors of the movement in Ecuador, Alberto Acosta, well-being cannot be reduced to the occidental notion and needs to be based open up, relying on indigenous cosmologies and interpretations.

Moreover, and as in [55–58], we believe that this approach offers an alternative in the mode of development, rather than only a discussion on how to measure well-being. Ziai [54] when studying post-development alternatives have compared Buen Vivir, Ubuntu,<sup>10</sup> and Degrowth proposals, concluding that Buen Vivir is the only initiative that constitutes a real post-development strategy. In general, it can be said that both Buen Vivir and Ubuntu constitute *"retro-progressive utopias"* that connect the values of the old communities to the currents of contemporary critical thoughts, looking toward emancipatory, socio-ecologically, and sustainable futures.

The notion of Buen Vivir implies a bigger change in the way we run our economies, and it fulfills the lacking connection between well-being and development, also covered by the Chilean Max Neef in [22]. As reference [59] points out, Buen Vivir must be understood as "concept in construction that is taking place in a wide variety of contexts and that is characterized precisely because of its plurality." The term must be contextualized in its environment understanding the Andine culture and the peasantindigenous-native cosmovision.<sup>11</sup>

An important distinctive characteristic about these approaches needs to be made. Nowadays, as we have seen, multiple proposals and initiatives are emerging across the globe to challenge the hegemonic power asking to the "ancestral culture" (the "vernacular culture") of the world of our ancestors to recreate and redefine what it means to "live well" in our century. As it is explained in [60], the initiatives in the North

<sup>10</sup> Ubuntu is a philosophical concept widely known in sub-Saharan Africa which derives from the Xhosa phrase "Ubuntu ungamntu ngabanye abantu," which means "A person is a person through other persons" [54].

<sup>11</sup> A cosmovision is the "the way of seeing Oneself, Feeling, perceiving and Projecting The World that varies in culture" [58].

### *(Material) Well-Being in Economics: Beyond GDP DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.108306*

of "Slow movement"<sup>12</sup> and "Transition"<sup>13</sup> has been popularized and it's not a new concept. However, Buen Vivir is present on the collective memory of the pleasentindigenous-native of the Global South for sicles. What is new is that from this perspective a new platform for the political economy has opened [56]. Acknowledged this stating that while in Ecuador and Bolivia it is already a political and constitutional discussion, in countries like Argentina, Colombia, Chile, and Mexico its importance in the political discourse is increasing. As it is pointed out in [61], everyday there are more and more voices being raised in the world that are in some way in tune with this indigenous vision [61].

Ecuador and Bolivia recognize constitutionally, for the first time, the principles of Buen Vivir in Ecuador (*su*p*ak kawsay* in Kichwa) and Vivir Bien in Bolivia (*suma qamaña* in Aymara) [62]. Both seek to return to the ancestral principles of their indigenous cultures, which can be generally summarized as the notion of living in harmony with nature. The visions of Buen Vivir seek a greater harmony of the human being in three dimensions: with her/himself, with their congeners/comrades, and with nature. In this sense, Buen Vivir involves the achieving of internal harmony (with one self), harmony with the community and between communities (with the other), and harmony with nature (with pachamama).

Internal harmony implies that people can develop their full human potential, and that everything they can "be" (ser and estar, explained later on) and "do", and they do so in a framework of freedom. It is related to the extended reproduction of life and human rights; it requires having—especially— good physical and mental health. It considers the supremacy of work over capital and contemplates that the economy must be at the service of the people. It also includes the balance in the allocation of time between paid work, unpaid work, and leisure. This notion of time from these approaches is fundamental for this thesis. As it is pointed out in [63], modern capitalism, in its way, has ensured that the unavoidable leisure time is associated with unemployment, so it causes misery instead of being a universal source of happiness.

Harmony with the community and between communities means that people live together as equals, and that they have the will to live together well. It is related to strengthening social relationships, interactions and cooperative ties, relationships of solidarity, reciprocity, fraternity, sorority, and respecting diversity. It covers inclusion, cohesion, social capital, participation, and interculturality. It requires promoting equality and reducing disparities. In addition, it understands the economic system

<sup>12</sup> "The Slow Movement" is a term that describes a wide range of diverse projects, initiatives, and efforts taking place around the world that seek to reconnect human beings in more meaningful and sustainable relationships with other human beings, with the natural world and its specific locale, and with themselves. The Slow Movement arose as an effort to counter the fast-paced, commodity-focused, unbalanced, and impersonal nature of much of modern human culture" (Adapted from http://www.create-the-good-life. com/slow\_movement.html)

<sup>13</sup> "The Transition Movement" is made up of vibrant, grassroots community initiatives that seek to build community resilience in the face of challenges such as peak oil, climate change, and economic crisis. Transition Initiatives differentiate themselves from other groups and "environmental "of sustainability, seeking to mitigate these converging global crises by engaging their communities in harvesting citizen-led education, action, and multi-stakeholder planning to increase local self-reliance and resilience." (Taken from http://transitionus.org/transition-town-movement)

as social and solidarity.<sup>14</sup> Harmony with nature implies that people, companies, and society respect the natural environment, which is the source of the reproduction of life. It understands the economy as a subsystem of a larger system called the biosphere and that environmental conditions directly or indirectly affect people's lives, just as human activities affect the environment. It is related to the rights of nature, intergenerational justice, and environmental sustainability.

Vivir Bien in Ecuador emphasizes the protection of the environment and the display of solidarity and is built on the historical experience of indigenous communities that have lived in harmony with nature [64]. Buen Vivir in Bolivia, on the other hand, recognizes the *ethos* of the indigenous communities including and promoting the following principles: prioritize life, respect differences, live in complementarity, reach consensus between agreements, balance and harmony with nature, defend the identity, accept the differences, prioritize cosmic rights, know how to eat, know how to drink, know how to dance, know how to work, know how to communicate, come back to the *abya laya,* protect the seeds, respect women, and "live well, not better" [60].

From the vast literature analyzing the cosmovision of Buen Vivir, we will explain the five basic principles of the theory that are fundamental for the development of this thesis. They are:

<sup>14</sup> Expressed by Acosta (2010), the basic value of the economy, under a Buen Vivir regime, is solidarity. A different economy is sought, one based on the social and solidarity links, different from that is characterized by supposedly free competition, which encourages economic cannibalism among human beings and which fuels financial speculation. Based on this constitutional definition, the aim is to build relations of production, exchange, and cooperation that foster efficiency and quality, based on solidarity.

<sup>15</sup> Although the term "Pachamama" is generally translated to Mother Earth (in Spanish) or Mother Nature (in English), the term derives from two Aymara words: "pacha" and "mama." The word "pacha" in Aymara refers to "the totality of the being." The word "mama" in Aymara refers to "the mother." "Pachamama, therefore, it is the telluric mother of the world and being" ([58], p. 21).

her/his being.<sup>16</sup> Using the senses will allow us to come back to a wider notion of the being, understanding the immaterial nonrational and spiritual part of the construct, which is crucial for this thesis.<sup>17</sup>

Buen Vivir presupposes that there is free time for both contemplation and emancipation, and it is needed for the freedoms, opportunities, and capabilities of people to increase.

Far from an economy overdetermined by mercantile relations, Buen Vivir aims to build dynamic and constructive relations between the market, society, and the State. It seeks to build a society with a diversity of different types of markets, so as not to have a market society, that is, a commodified society.

In sum, Buen Vivir encompasses a set of ideas that are being forged as a reaction and alternative to conventional concepts of development. Under the concept, there are various reflections that, with great intensity, explore new creative perspectives both in the plane of ideas as in practices. Reference [57] argues that there are a lot of specific practical strategies that are being held, such as the introduction of

<sup>16</sup> Does your back hurt right now because of the way you are sitting? If you just realized this, in this moment you are experiencing through the "estar" of your being. Are you hungry? Do you listen with attention? Do you hear your inner (body) sounds? Are you conscious of your own breathing?

<sup>17</sup> It is also interesting noticing the different way in which languages have named well-being: whereas in Spanish it is bien-estar, stressing the notion of the estar, in Italian, another language who differentiates the verb to be, uses the term ben-essere, stressing the notion of the ser/essere.

<sup>18</sup> The best explanation of this notion of "dynamic equilibrium" between two supposedly dichotomic and contradictory parts was provided by Jung (1933) in his description of the card "The World": a dancer in pause, a subtle and little space in between the movement and the quiet. The answer to the question: How can we distinguish the dancer from the dance if in physics we were taught that we are a dance of particles? embeds this state of in-betweenness.

environmental accounting, tax reforms, the dematerialization of economies, and alternative integration in regions in South America.

### *4.4.1 Four existential categories of well-being: doing, having, being… & being?*

In the studies of well-being exists—either explicitly or implicitl—the recognition of four existential categories in which the well-being is realized. These categories have been used in the frameworks of human needs and well-being explicitly [22, 65] and implicitly [11, 66]. The four categories and their differences are emphasized by the Buen Vivir scholars. In English, however, the categories are reduced to three, as the verb *to be* has no distinction as in other languages. For instance, distinct verbs, such as "ser" and "estar" (in Spanish), or "essere" and "stare" (in Italian) are translated as "to be" in English. The four categories, thus, are: "ser" (to be), "estar" (to be), "hacer" (to do), "tener" (to have).

Reference [67] has provided arguments for the differentiation inside the verb to be (not from a Buen Vivir perspective, but from a psychological perspective), arguing that while "estar" is a temporal state, "ser" is immutable and infinite and therefore more accurate to be related with happiness. However, the perspective of Buen Vivir, as mentioned before, stresses that the exercise of humans to live a complete life is to "stay" *(permanecer)* in a constant present moment, in a state of permanent awareness that we are here, in between the infinite dynamics of our world, and through this practice, realize our whole being. This is why, for example, the word Ñasa in jñatjo<sup>19</sup> language (one of the cosmovision of Buen Vivir) means "look up to the sky" and consists on a fundamental activity for these societies, as devoting time of the day just to look at the sky allows us to "stay" (permanecer in Spanish) and "estar" (being), living the present moment [68]. For this approach, the notion of being is reached through the deepest connection of oneself with the *Pachamama—*mother earth or Gaia [61, 66, 69, 70]. The differential approach to welfare made in [70] also associates the "being" to the possibility to live in harmony with nature. In this sense, both approaches would integrate the relationship with nature in the core of the concept of "being." In this line, we will argue then that the notion of "estar" is not related to the hedonist pleasure defined before, as argued in [67], but it is a challenge to feel the senses in order to increase our immaterial well-being. Thus, the notion of "ser"—still fundamental for the well-being, we are not undermining, but differentiating—, it is more "contaminated" by modernity and therefore its connection with the immaterial is not as straightforward as it is with "estar." Both "ser" and "estar," however, correspond to the notion of being. Their common characteristic is that the needs of the being are realized by internal incentives and stimulus, and not external. Unlike the having and the doing, which imply the existence of an external source, the being does not.

<sup>19</sup> The language Jñatjo belongs to the community Jñatjo, located in San Agustín Mextepec, Municipality of San Felipe of Progress, Mexico. The language jñatjo—also known as mazahua—is an indigenous language whose etymological root is derived by the—deer—and the suffix hua—owner or the one who possesses and in conjunction, "deer people."

# **5. Conclusion**

Within the existing utilitarian framework, "there can be no overconsumption of goods of any kind, since by definition a good is simply something a consumer wants to buy" (see [2]) because it gives them well-being: the more, the better. On a macrolevel, this philosophy has been translated that more GDP brings more well-being, happiness, or welfare. This has led us to the current state we are in now: nation states with more unequal societies, that only pursue the paradigm of growth, with not attention to its distribution, and leading to excessive overconsumption patterns that are hurting our planet and putting in risk the lives of future generation.

The literature seen has showed us the necessity to overcome the automatic and positive relationship between growth and well-being and oblies us to reconfigure the way we measure well-being in our societies. Since the Easterlin Paradox published in 1974, where it was proven that up to a certain level more income it is not translated into more happiness, the corpus of Economics should focus on building a wider notion of happiness or well-being, accepting it involves more components than the material. Initiatives such as the Gross National Happiness (GNH) in Bhutan or the cosmovision of Buen Vivir in Latin America are an example of this large path the economic field needs to begin. The construct of well-being cannot be more associated with material growth: the good life and the human development as a whole is a much more complex phenomena that needs urgent attention.

The idea of human development must be opposed to the fetishism of numbers in order to resolve this challenge. The emergence of social wills that strive for participation, autonomy, and a fairer distribution of the available resources must be opposed to vertical management by the State and the exploitation of some groups by others. Hence, the implementation of alternative pathways to well-being in Economics, mentioned in this chapter, have gained unprecedented significance.

# **Author details**

Marisol Manfredi Economic Policies for the Global Transition (EPOG) Alumni

\*Address all correspondence to<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
© 2022 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. Distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution - NonCommercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits use, distribution and reproduction for non-commercial purposes, provided the original is properly cited.

# **References**

[1] Valdés M. Dos aspectos en el concepto de bienestar. 1991. pp. 69-89. ISSN 0214-8876

[2] Skidelsky E, Skidelsky R. How Much is Enough?: Money and the good life. United Kigndom: Penguin; 2012

[3] López MF, Pazos L. Historia del pensamiento económico. AZ editora. 1998

[4] Giarrizzo V, Ferrer D. El retorno de la felicidad a la economía: una mirada teórica y un análisis empírico sobre cómo perciben los argentinos su" satisfacción con la vida" en el plano económico. Faces. 2015;**21**(45):67-86

[5] Calzada I, Gómez-Garrido M, Fernández LM, Moreno-Fuentes FJ. Regímenes de bienestar y valores en Europa. Revista Española de Investigaciones Sociológicas (REIS). 2013;**141**(1):61-90

[6] Manfredi M. Otras formas de medir el bienestar: una propuesta para el tercer milenio. Propuestas para el Desarrollo. 2017;**I**:35-52

[7] Phélan M, Levy S, y Guillén, A. Sistematización de índices e indicadores alternativos de desarrollo para América Latina. Revista temas de coyuntura. 2012;(66). Recuperado a partir de: https:// revistasenlinea.saber.ucab.edu.ve/index. php/temasdecoyuntura/article/view/1338

[8] Meadows DH, Randers J, Meadows DL. The Limits to Growth; A Report for the Club of Rome's Project on the Predicament of Mankind. New York: Universe Books; 1972

[9] Mill JS. John Stuart Mill on the stationary state. Population and Development Review. 1986;**12**(2):317-322 [10] Hausman DM, McPherson MS. Preference satisfaction and welfare economics. Economics & Philosophy. 2009;**25**(1):1-25

[11] Doyal L, Gough I. Who Needs Human Needs?. In A Theory of Human Need. London: Palgrave; 1991. pp. 9-21

[12] Seaford C. Why Capitalists Need Communists. ([edition unavailable]). London: Springer International Publishing; 2019. Avilable from: https:// www.perlego.com/book/3485691/ why-capitalists-need-communists-thepolitics-of-flourishing-pdf. (Original work published 2019)

[13] Nussbaum, Martha & Sen, Amartya (1993). The Quality of Life Master of Trinity College. Cambridge. Print ISBN<PHONE_NUMBER>, 1993

[14] Stiglitz JE, Sen A, Fitoussi JP. Report by the commission on the measurement of economic performance and social progress. 2009

[15] García NJ. Prácticas alimentarias en los siglos XVII y XVIII en el clero regular de Aragón: los manjares de la comunidad de monjes de San Juan de la Peña. Studium: Revista de humanidades. 2009;**15**:165-198

[16] Gough I. Climate change and sustainable welfare: The centrality of human needs. Cambridge Journal of Economics. 2015;**39**(5):1191-1214

[17] Laurent E. From welfare to farewell: The European Social-ecological State Beyond Economic Growth (June 17, 2021). ETUI Research Paper - Working Paper 2021.04. 2021. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3873766 or DOI: 10.2139/ssrn.3873766

[18] Max-Neef MA. Desarrollo a escala humana: Conceptos, aplicaciones y

*(Material) Well-Being in Economics: Beyond GDP DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.108306*

algunas reflexiones. Vol. 66. Chile: Icaria Editorial; 1991

[19] Kahneman D. Thinking, Fast and Slow. United States: Macmillan; 2011

[20] Duggleby W, Cooper D, Penz K. Hope, self-efficacy, spiritual well-being and job satisfaction. Journal of Advanced Nursing. 2009;**65**(11):2376-2385

[21] Eceiza MMA. Economía y justicia social: cuatro tradiciones éticas. Información Comercial Española, ICE: Revista de economía. 2005;**823**:199-216

[22] Sen A. Justice: Means versus freedoms. Philosophy & Public Affairs. 1990:111-121

[23] Easterlin RA. Does economic growth improve the human lot? Some empirical evidence. Germany: University Library of Munich; MPRA Paper 111773. 1974. pp. 89-125

[24] Lora E, Ñopo H. La formación de los economistas en América Latina. Revista de análisis económico. 2009;**24**(2):65-93

[25] Sen A. Description as choice. Oxford Economic Papers. 1980;**32**(3):353-369

[26] Argyle M, Crossland J. The dimensions of positive emotions. British Journal of Social Psychology. 1987;**26**(2):127-137

[27] Bauman Z. Is there a postmodern sociology? Theory, Culture & Society. 1988;**5**(2-3):217-237

[28] Durning AT. How much is enough?: The consumer society and the future of the earth (1st ed.). New York: Norton; 1992

[29] Frey BS, Stutzer A. Happiness, economy and institutions. The Economic Journal. 2000;**110**(466):918-938

[30] Inglehart R, Foa R, Peterson C, Welzel C. Development, Freedom, and Rising Happiness: A Global Perspective (1981-2007). Perspectives on Psychological Science. 2008;**3**(4):264-285. Available from: http://www.jstor.org/ stable/40212250

[31] Layard R. Good jobs and bad jobs. CEP Occasional Papers 19, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE; 2004

[32] Purdy M, Dupey P. Holistic flow model of spiritual wellness. Counseling and Values. 2005;**49**(2):95-106

[33] Gluzmann P, Gasparini L. International inequality in subjective well-being: An exploration with the Gallup World Poll. Review of Development Economics. 2018;**22**(2):610-631

[34] Diener E, Seligman ME. Beyond money: Toward an economy of wellbeing. Psychological Science in the Public Interest. 2004;**5**(1):1-31

[35] Layard R. Happiness: Has Social Science a Clue? Vol. 24. London: London School of Economics, Lionel Robbins Memorial Lecture 2002/3, London, UK; 2003. Available from: http://cep.lse.ac.uk/ events/lectures/layard/RL030303.pdf

[36] Layard R. Rethinking public economics: The implications of rivalry and habit. Economics and happiness. 2005;**1**(1):147-170

[37] Rojas M, Elizondo-Lara M. Satisfacción de vida en Costa Rica: Un enfoque de dominios de vida. Latin American Research Review. 2012;**47**(1):78-94. Available from: http://resolver.scholarsportal.info/ resolve/00238791/v47i0001/78\_ sdvecruedddv.xm

[38] Esteve EB. Well-being and performance in academic settings: The predicting role of self-efficacy ([Doctoral dissertation], Universitat Jaume I, Departament de Psicologia Evolutiva, Educativa, Social i Metodologia). 2008

[39] Actis Di Pasquale E. Bienestar Social: Un análisis teórico y metodológico como base para la medición de la dinámica histórica en la Argentina. In: II Jornadas de Historia Económica. 2008

[40] Actis Di Pasquale E, Barboni G, Florio EM, Ibarra FL, Savino JV. El impacto del aislamiento social preventivo y obligatorio por COVID-19 sobre el trabajo, los ingresos y el cuidado en la ciudad de Mar del Plata. Trabajo y Sociedad. 2020;**21**(35):83-108

[41] Teixeira IND, Neri AL. Successful aging: a goal in the course of life. Psicologia USP. 2008;**19**:81-94

[42] Lora E, Prada SI. Técnicas de medición económica. Metodología y aplicaciones en Colombia. 2008;**4**

[43] Drewnowski J, Scott W. The level of living index. In: Ekistics; Report 4 (Geneva: United Nations Research Institute for Social Development). 1966. pp. 266-275

[44] Manfredi M, Di Pasquale EA. Medición del bienestar objetivo y subjetivo: una propuesta de índice de desarrollo humano integral. Revista de economía mundial. 2021;(57):161-186. ISSN 2340-4264. DOI: 10.33776/rem. v0i57.4648

[45] Kliksberg B. El informe Kliksberg. Bután: El modelo de la felicidad. Encuentro: Argentina. 2015. Recuperado de: http://www.encuentro.gov.ar/sitios/ encuentro/programas/ver

[46] Sen A. Utilitarianism and welfarism. The Journal of Philosophy. 1979;**76**(9):463-489

[47] Actis Di Pasquale. 2012

[48] Sen A. Well-being, agency and freedom: The Dewey Lectures 1984. The Journal of Philosophy. 1985;**82**(4):169-221

[49] Sen AK. Bienestar, justicia y mercado (No. E50 1028). Ediciones Paidós, Barcelona Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona. 2000

[50] Cejudo Córdoba R. Capacidades y libertad: una aproximación a la teoría de Amartya Sen. Revista Internacional De Sociología. 2007;**65**(47):9-22. DOI: 10.3989/ris.2007.i47.50

[51] Actis Di Pasquale E. Hacia una definición conceptual de bienestar social. El debate desde la economía del bienestar hasta enfoque de las capacidades. In VI Encuentro Regional de Estudios del Trabajo. Tandil [ARG], septiembre 2015:7-8. ISBN 978-950-658-376-7

[52] Sen A. Poverty and Famines: An Essay on Entitlement and Deprivation. Clarendon Press, Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press; 1982

[53] Ziai A. Post-development concepts? Buen vivir, ubuntu and degrowth. In: Fourth International Conference on Degrowth for Ecological Sustainability and Social Equity. 2014, September

[54] Acosta A. Buen vivir Sumak Kawsay: una oportunidad para imaginar otros mundos. Editorial Abya-Yala; 2012

[55] Choquehuanca D. 25 Postulados para Entender el Vivir Bien. La Paz, Bolivia: La Razon; 2010

[56] Gudynas E. Buen vivir: Germinando alternativas al desarrollo. América Latina en movimiento. 2011;**462**:1-20

*(Material) Well-Being in Economics: Beyond GDP DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.108306*

[57] Huanacuni-Mamani F. Vivir Bien/Buen Vivir: Filosofía, Políticas, Estrategias y Experiencias Regionales. 1.st ed. La Paz: Convenio Andrés Bello; 2010

[58] Fatheuer T. Buen vivir: A brief introduction to Latin America's new concepts for the good life and the rights of nature. Heinrich Böll Foundation; 2011

[59] Voller V. Casa de los Ningunos: un estudio de caso sobre la re-imaginando de "Sumak Qamaña" en un contexto urbano y contemporáneo. 2015

[60] Acosta, 2008

[61] Aguado M, Calvo D, Dessal C, Riechmann J, González J, Montes C. La necesidad de repensar el bienestar humano en un mundo cambiante. Papeles de relaciones ecosociales y cambio global. 2012;**119**(2):49-76

[62] Russell B. Mysticism and Logic. Courier Corporation; 2013

[63] Acosta A. Otra economía para otra civilización. Temas. 2013;**75**:21-27

[64] Linera ÁG. Forma valor y forma comunidad. Traficantes de Sueños; 2015

[65] Acosta, Alberto, El buen vivir. una oportunidad por construir (Tema Central). En: Ecuador Debate. Innovaciones y retos constitucionales, Quito: CAAP. 2009. pp. 33-47. ISSN: 1012-1498

[66] Torán F. Más allá de la materia: Un salto cuántico en tu crecimiento espiritual. B de Books; Sipan Barcelona Network SL. Travessera de Gràcia, Barcelona Sipan Barcelona Network SL. es una empresa del grupo Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial, SAU. 2017:47-49. 08021. ISBN DIGITAL: 978- 84-9069-807-5 2017

[67] Cardoso-Ruiz RP, del Carmen Gives-Fernández L, Lecuona-Miranda ME, Nicolás-Gómez R. Elementos para el debate e interpretación del Buen vivir/Sumak kawsay. Contribuciones desde Coatepec. Coatepec. 2016;(31). Universidad Autónoma del Estado de México. http://www.redalyc.org/articulo. oa?id=28150017005

[68] Ulcuango Sandoval YJ. Aportes del Sumak Kawsay o Buen Vivir a la educación ecuatoriana desde la Constitución del 2008 hasta la actualidad [Bachelor's thesis], Quito: UCE. 2021

[69] Cruz Rodríguez E. Hacia una ética del vivir bien-buen vivir. Producción+ limpia. 2014;**9**(2):11-22

[70] Allardt E. Having, loving, being: An alternative to the Swedish model of welfare research. The Quality of Life. 1993;**8**:88-95

# **Chapter 19**

# The Relationship between Fandom and Well-Being

*Kei Aoki*

# **Abstract**

This study focuses on the relationship between fandom and well-being. Fandom refers to the act of endorsing something, whether it is a person or a nonperson such as an artist, game character, or specific brand. In other words, fandom can be seen as the ultimate customer engagement. Previous study has suggested that customerbrand engagement contributes to improved customer well-being with the concept of flourishing. This study provides quantitative support for this finding by surveying those involved in fandoms. Under the COVID-19 pandemic conditions, people were subjected to various behavioral restrictions. Entertainment was deemed unnecessary, and various events had to be canceled or scaled back. However, fans supported their favorites in a variety of ways and in turn found fulfillment and happiness through such activities. In the long run, the act would have contributed to the improvement of the fans' own well-being. This study presents a way of value cocreation between the supporters and the recipients that can be paraphrased as that between a customer and brand.

**Keywords:** customer-brand engagement, well-being, fandom, co-creation, flourishing, PERMA

# **1. Introduction**

This study aims to contribute to the development of value co-creation between firms and their customers. Specifically, the study will focus not only on the advantages of the company but also on the advantages of the customer and will have implications for maximizing the customer's happiness. These days, while algorithms are being used to drive purchases, there are also active attempts by firms to engage customers and build brand experience together [1, 2]. This study takes the latter position and focuses on customer-brand engagement (CBE). This study will focus on highly engaged customers and investigate the benefits that CBE brings to them and present "the other side of CBE." There have been various studies that have addressed the benefits that CBE can bring to firms [2, 3]. On the other hand, Aoki and Ishizuka [4] focused on customers' benefits and suggested that CBE contributes to improved customer well-being with qualitative data for specific brands. This study tests their statement using quantitative data for a wide range of genres.

### **1.1 Customer-brand engagement**

CBE has been viewed as a precursor to brand loyalty [5, 6]. Brand loyalty includes attitudinal loyalty and behavioral loyalty [7, 8]. While behavioral loyalty increases corporate management metrics such as market share [7, 9–11], attitudinal loyalty refers to a customer's emotional attachment toward a brand [8, 12]. This study focuses on attitudinal loyalty and examines how it influences on customers.

CBE was defined as: "The level of a customer's cognitive, emotional, and behavioral investment in specific brand interactions" [13]. These inherent qualities remain the same in online CBE studies [14, 15]. This study follows Hollebeek's definition of CBE [13] and focuses on highly engaged customers.

### **1.2 Fandom as a phenomenon of high engagement**

In this study, the phenomenon of "fandom" is discussed in relation to CBE. Fandom is a general popular culture, including pop music, romance novels, comics, Hollywood mass-appeal stars, and so on, that has been reshaped by a specific group of people with a passion for it [16]. Pearson [17] points out that digital development has blurred the boundaries between firms and individual fans and is giving rise to new forms of cultural production. The ambiguity of the boundary between firm and customer has been noted in customer engagement studies, for example, Jaakkola and Alexander [18] point out that customer engagement behaviors contribute to value co-creation.

Under the COVID-19 pandemic conditions, people were subjected to various behavioral restrictions. Entertainment was deemed unnecessary, and various events had to be canceled or scaled back. However, fans continued to support their favorites in a variety of ways. In doing so, the fans themselves found their lives fulfilling and happy by engaging in online streaming and communication with other fans through social networking services. In fact, earlier studies have even shown that being a part of a fandom increases happiness [19, 20].

Such relationship could be explained as an ultimate CBE; customers are spending their time and passion to co-create value with the firm. Fandom is not only about real people but also about a variety of things, including in-game characters, specific regions, and buildings, even endorsements of specific brands are included.

### **1.3 The relationship between customer-brand engagement and well-being**

Aoki and Ishizuka [4] focused on highly engaged brand customers, including both hedonic and utilitarian brands, and suggested that CBE could increase customers' well-being. They examined the process of deepening customer engagement and considered how the brand-customer relationship impacts customer's well-being using PERMA model developed in positive psychology to measure flourishing [21]. PERMA stands for positive emotions, engagement, relationships with others, meaning in life, and accomplishment.

It has been argued that happiness and well-being, despite being closely related concepts [22], should be distinguished [23]. Ryff [24] delineated well-being as enduring life challenges, such as having a sense of purpose and direction, achieving satisfying relationships with others, and gaining a sense of self-realization. Seligman [21] also pointed out that well-being sometimes includes hardships; however, people could still find life satisfaction and feel a sense of accomplishment. He defined well-being as the ultimate objective of positive psychology and argued that well-being is sustainable *The Relationship between Fandom and Well-Being DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.106870*

and separate from "happiness" in the aspects of time span [21]. In terms of fandom, while each activity is one time, the overall activity is sustained and embedded in the lives of the participants. Thus, this study focuses on the relationship between fandom and well-being as encompassing even happiness.

Aoki and Ishizuka [4] found that all the PERMA elements were included in the deepening CBE process and that of these, relationships with others are deeply related, based on qualitative data. This study aims to provide quantitative support for their finding by surveying those involved in fandom representing highly engaged customers. This study will investigate the following research question: Does fandom increase the well-being of the participants?

# **2. Method**

# **2.1 Sample**

The data were collected through a market research company from February 22 to 25, 2022. Data from 2046 respondents (aged 18 to 65 years, mean age 42.8 years, 54.5% male) were used in the survey after removing an unreliable sample of 2067 respondents. Then, the respondents were divided into fandom participants and nonparticipants to compare levels of well-being.

### **2.2 The level of involvement in fandom**

First, the respondents were asked if they engage in fandom (multiple answer):

Other than those who chose 4), respondents were asked to describe the activities related to fandom. Following the finding of Aoki and Ishizuka (4), this study examines fandom based on the relationships with others. In addition to relationships between the fans themselves and their favorites and relationships with other fans, fandom also includes experiences that are encountered by the fans themselves. The respondents who are involved in fandom described the frequency of 10 activities as: (1) never, (2) seldom, (3) sometimes, and (4) usually (**Table 1**).

### **2.3 The level of well-being**

The level of well-being was measured using a PERMA-Profiler developed by Butler and Kern [25] via 11 international surveys (N = 31, 966). The respondents evaluated each of the 15 items (three items per PERMA domain) (**Table 2**) on an 11-point Likert

### **Table 1.**

*Fandom activities in the questionnaire.*

scale (0 to 10). The average score of the three questions per element was used in the analysis as it is recommended by Butler and Kern [25].

# **2.4 Control variables**

In addition to the data of fandom and well-being, the following data were collected as control variables: age, gender (1 = male, 0 = female), marital status (1 = married and 0 = unmarried), employment status (1 = unemployed, 2 = part-time, 3 = fulltime), educational background (1 = junior high school, 2 = high school, 3 = college, 4 = undergrad, 5 = graduate school), annual income level (1 = 0, 2 = less than JPY 1 million, 3 = less than JPY 2 million, …, 11 = less than JPY 12 million, 13 = less than JPY 15 million, 14 = less than JPY 20 million, 15 = more JPY 20 million approx. USD 1.5 thousand). For clarification, employment status represents the length of labor time, and educational background represents the length of educational period.

*Not*q*. Respondents are shown in alternating order.*

*The PERMA-Profiler consists of 23 items that include elements other than PERMA; 15 items are highlighted for the analysis of this study.*

**Table 2.** *PERMA-profiler (Butler and Kern, 2016).*

## **2.5 Analysis**

First, the respondents were divided into the fandom participants and nonparticipants. Then, the score of each element of PERMA between two groups was compared. To validate the results, multiple regression analyses were conducted to verify the relationship between the elements of PERMA and the participation in fandom (1 = yes and 0 = no) and other attributes as control variables. Although the data included ordinal and dummy variables, they were used in the analysis as proxy variables for the relative magnitude of each item. Finally, a cluster analysis was conducted to classify the fandom participants by their involvement in the activities and analyze fandom in a more detailed format.

# **3. Results**

# **3.1 The relationship between fandom and PERMA**

The respondents' (n = 2046) participation in the fandom was as follows (multiple answer):

Those who chose the fourth option (n = 994, mean age 45.3 years, 54.0% male) were classified as non-fandom participants, and the rest were classified as participants (n = 1052, mean age 40.4 years, 55.0% male).

First, the level of well-being of the two groups was compared using the PERMA model, which consists of positive emotion (α = 0.85), engagement (α = 0.79), relationship (α = 0.81), meaning (α = 0.89), and accomplishment (α = 0.82) (see details in **Table 2**). It includes an item with a Cronbach's alpha slightly below 0.8, but in view of the design of the scale itself, the original version of the scale was retained. As a result, fandom participants showed significantly higher levels of well-being in all criteria—positive emotion (*t* = 5.95, *df* = 2010.18, *p* < 0.001), engagement (*t* = 10.04, *df* = 2003.63, *p* < 0.001), relationship (*t* = 5.44, *df* = 2029.87, *p* < 0.001), meaning (*t* = 5.40, *df* = 2027.15, *p* < 0.001), and accomplishment (t = 4.91, *df* = 2019.62, *p* < 0.001)—than the nonparticipants (**Table 3**).

Furthermore, regression analysis was conducted to examine the impact of participation in fandom after eliminating other factors that could influence well-being. The dependent variables are the elements of PERMA, and the independent variables are the fandom dummy, gender dummy, age, marital status dummy, educational background, employment status, and annual income. Before the analysis, to avoid multicollinearity, it was confirmed that the residuals of each dependent variable followed a normal distribution and the VIF of each independent variable is less than 3 (**Table 4**). The results showed that participation in knowledge sharing was a significant predictor of all PERMA elements: positive emotion (*β* = 0.12, t = 4.80, *p* < .001), engagement (*β* = 0.19, t = 7.56, *p* < .001), relationship (*β* = 0.10, t = 3.93, *p* < .001), meaning (*β* = 0.11, t = 4.28, *p* < .001), and accomplishment (*β* = 0.10, t = 4.16, *p* < .001).

### **Table 3.**

*Comparison of the level of well-being in two groups.*

Therefore, it was shown that participation to the fandom had a significantly positive impact on the level of well-being.

# **3.2 Classification of fandom participants**

To gain a better understanding of fandom, cluster analysis was conducted by the frequency of fandom activities by adopting the k-means method. After applying the number of clusters from two to five, the participants were classified into four clusters (**Table 7**). Each cluster was characterized as follows: Cluster 1 participants (n = 321, mean age = 41.0 years, 55.1% male) are more willing to engage in activities with peers than doing them alone (**Table 7**). They seem to go out to see a live concert or enjoy viewing their favor's contents in home if someone does together or invite them and would not do it alone. Thus, they are named "accompanying." In contrast, Cluster 3 participants (n = 176, mean age = 42.2 years, 54.0% male) prefer to do fandom-related activities alone (**Table 7**). They can accompany someone to the same extent as Cluster 1 participants, but they are more likely to go alone; accordingly, they are named "independent." Cluster 2 participants (n = 313, mean age = 35.5 years, 56.2% male) are frequent with respect to overall fandom activity (**Table 7**). They work with their peers, sometimes alone, and even contact their favorites directly. It shows that they invest a lot of time and effort into their fandom, and thus, they are named "enthusiastic." In opposition, Cluster 4 (n = 242, mean age = 44.5 years, 54.1% male) showed overall infrequency in fandomrelated activities (**Table 7**). They engage in fandom without going out and buying goods, in other words, spend less time and money. Therefore, they are named "casual".

Each cluster has a different degree of involvement in fandom and with others through it. This study examined the levels of PERMA for each cluster to see if such a difference in fandom involvement affects well-being. As a result of ANOVA, there were significant differences among the clusters for each of the PERMA factors: positive emotion (*F* (3, 1048) = 16.98, *p* < 0.001), engagement (*F* (3, 1048) = 17.35, *p* < 0.001), relationship (*F* (3, 1048) = 23.72, *p* < 0.001), meaning (*F* (3, 1048) = 17.46, *p* < 0.001), and accomplishment (*F* (3, 1048) = 15.41, *p* < 0.001).

Subsequently, differences in mean values of each PERMA element were assessed with Bonferroni multiple comparison (**Table 5**). The results indicated that the "enthusiastic" cluster (Cluster 2) showed significant higher levels in all PERMA elements than the other clusters (**Table 5**).

**Table 4.**

*The results of regression analysis.*

*The Relationship between Fandom and Well-Being DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.106870*

**361**

**Table 5.**

*The result of multiple comparisons.*

### *Happiness and Wellness - Biopsychosocial and Anthropological Perspectives*

**362**

# **Table 6.**

<sup>r</sup> *Distribution of fandom objects by clusters.*

*The Relationship between Fandom and Well-Being DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.106870*

**Table 6** shows the distribution of fandom objects by clusters. A chi-square test revealed that the distribution of fandom objective significantly differs in clusters (χ2 = 67.79, *df* = 18, *p* < .001). The "enthusiastic" Cluster 2 participants tended to have more multiples, which means that they have multiple favorites across genres and accordingly spent a lot of time and effort on fandom. The "independent" participants of Cluster 3 are more likely to target fandoms other than people and characters, which is consistent with them acting alone. The "casual" Cluster 4 participants had a relatively high percentage of respondents who supported only the person without crossing genres. The "accompanying" participants of Cluster 1 had a similar distribution as the total.

# **4. Conclusions**

This study explored if fandom increases the well-being of the participants, and it was empirically demonstrated. The fandom participants showed significant higher levels of well-being. The "enthusiastic" cluster (Cluster 2 in **Table 7**), which showed the highest involvement in fandom, depicted significantly higher levels of PERMA elements among others. Focusing on this cluster, it can be concluded that

### **Table 7.** *The results of cluster analysis.*

*The Relationship between Fandom and Well-Being DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.106870*

the improvement in well-being that is associated with participation in fandom is not provided by someone else, but by the participants themselves, through their own active involvements. They may work with their peers or even alone, depending on the situation. Some are even involved in more than one genre of fandom, and it can be assumed that they select the target to support and how to support it of their own volition. If relationships with others contributed to better well-being, the "accompanying" cluster (Cluster 1 in **Table 7**) would show higher values than the "independent" and "casual" clusters (Cluster 3 and 4 in **Table 7** respectively), but no significant differences were identified. Accordingly, this study concludes that spontaneous participation in fandom improves well-being.

This conclusion is in line with Aoki and Ishizuka [4], which suggested that the process of constructing CBE could positively impact customers' well-being. They noted that brands and customers recognize a mutual alignment of values and build strong engagement in the process of achieving each goal [4]. In this process, rather than benefitting from something from the brand, customers were gaining opportunities for personal growth and self-actualization through the brand [4]. In this study, fandom participants were indicated to have improved their well-being by acting on their own initiative. This study aimed to provide quantitative support for the findings of Aoki and Ishizuka [4]. Finally, it was suggested that the two studies are also consistent qualitatively.

### **5. Implications**

This study exhibited the benefits of CBE to customers themselves by showing the benefit of fandom participants. While various studies have addressed the benefits that CBE can bring to firms [2, 3], this study presents new findings by focusing on benefits on the customer side and contributes to a better understanding of CBE.

Furthermore, this study added new findings to fandom research by showing that participation in fandom improves well-being using findings in positive psychology. While fandom has been shown to increase happiness [19, 20], this study demonstrates empirically that it leads to increased well-being over the long term. This study is notable in that it focuses not on a relationship between a particular favorite and a fan, but the activities of fandom itself. It is a more natural state of daily life to consider people's well-being and ensures the validity of the findings.

This study is even a blow to consumerism. Although consumerism was initially advocated for the purpose of protecting consumer rights [26], it has even been argued in recent years that it encourages mass consumption and reduces consumer well-being [27, 28]. In recent years, the diffusion of the Internet has led to the consideration of digital consumerism, which does not compromise the well-being of consumers [29]. On the other hand, it has been pointed out since the 1990s that companionship and social support improve well-being more than consumption behavior [30]. Consistent with these findings, this study shows that companies do not promote materialism and reduce people's well-being but can amplify it by providing opportunities to engage with society.

These findings have important practical implications. This study showed that firms can deepen customer relationships while improving the customers' well-being. This means that value co-creation between the firm and its customers can enhance the well-being of the participants. By achieving this, a firm demonstrates its purpose, in addition to the commercial pursuit of profit. As the study results indicate that firms

do not directly enhance customers' well-being, it is important to motivate spontaneous behavior from customers. It will be significant to provide products and/or services that foster fandom, in other words, to make people enthusiastic about them. This will ultimately benefit both the firm and its customers and will be the achievement of essential value co-creation.

There are several limitations to this study. To increase the likelihood of fandom participants appearing in this study, a wide range of genres were surveyed. Therefore, while the results of this study were able to provide an overview, they were not able to go into detail. In order to increase the universality of the results of this study, a more in-depth study is required, including the collection of qualitative data. Additionally, the data for this study were collected entirely in Japan. Fandom is greatly influenced by cultural backgrounds. Future studies are expected to make cross-cultural comparisons.

# **Acknowledgements**

This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI [grant number 20 K13631].

# **Conflict of interest**

The author declares no conflict of interest.

# **Author details**

Kei Aoki Hirao School of Management, Konan University, Hyogo, Japan

\*Address all correspondence to<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
© 2022 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. Distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution - NonCommercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits use, distribution and reproduction for non-commercial purposes, provided the original is properly cited.

*The Relationship between Fandom and Well-Being DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.106870*

# **References**

[1] Sawhney M, Verona G, Prandelli E. Collaborating to create: The internet as a platform for customer engagement in product innovation. Journal of Interactive Marketing. 2005;**19**:4-17. DOI: 10.1002/dir.20046

[2] Ramaswamy V. Leading the transformation to co-creation of value. Strategy & Leadership. 2009;**37**(2):32-37. DOI: 10.1108/10878570910941208

[3] Kumar J, Nayak JK. Consumer psychological motivations to customer brand engagement: A case of brand community. Journal of Consumer Marketing. 2019;**36**(1):168-177. DOI: 10.1108/JCM-01-2018-2519

[4] Aoki K, Ishizuka C. How to build sustainable customer engagement that impacts customers' wellbeing? International Journal of Psychology and Behavior Analysis. 2022;**8**:186. DOI: https://doi. org/10.15344/2455-3867/2022/186

[5] Hollebeek L. Demystifying customer brand engagement: Exploring the loyalty nexus. Journal of Marketing Management. 2011;**27**(7-8):785-807. DOI: 10.1080/0267257X.2010.500132

[6] Leckie C, Nyadzayo MW, Johnson LW. Antecedents of consumer brand engagement and brand loyalty. Journal of Marketing Management. 2016;**32**(5-6):558-578. DOI: 10.1080/0267257X.2015.1131735

[7] Chaudhuri A, Holbrook MB. The chain of effects from brand trust and brand affect to brand performance: The role of brand loyalty. Journal of Marketing. 2001;**65**:81-93. DOI: 10.1509/ jmkg.<IP_ADDRESS>55

[8] Johnson MD, Herrmann A, Huber F. The evolution of loyalty intentions. Journal of Marketing. 2006;**70**:122-132. DOI: 10.1509%2Fjmkg.70.2.122

[9] Verhoef PC. Understanding the effect of customer relationship management efforts on customer retention and customer share development. Journal of Marketing. 2003;**67**(4):30-45. DOI: 10.1509/jmkg.<IP_ADDRESS>85

[10] Kumar V, Shah D. Building and sustaining profitable customer loyalty for the 21st century. Journal of Retailing. 2004;**80**(4):317-329

[11] Solem BAA. Influences of customer participation and customer brand engagement on brand loyalty. Journal of Consumer Marketing. 2016;**33**(5):332- 342. DOI: 10.1108/JCM-04-2015-1390

[12] Russell-Bennett R, McColl-Kennedy JR, Coote LV. Involvement, satisfaction, and brand loyalty in a small business services setting. Journal of Business Research. 2007;**60**:1253-1260. DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusres.2007.05.001

[13] Hollebeek L. Exploring customer brand engagement: Definition and themes. Journal of Strategic Marketing. 2011;**19**(7):555-573. DOI: 10.1080/0965254X.2011.599493

[14] Hollebeek L, Macky K. Digital content marketing's role in fostering consumer engagement, trust, and value: Framework, fundamental propositions, and implications. Journal of Interactive Marketing. 2019;**45**:27-41. DOI: 10.1016/j. intmar.2018.07.003

[15] Algharabat R, Rana NP, Alalwan AA, Baabdullah A, Gupta A. Investigating the antecedents of customer brand

engagement and consumer-based brand equity in social media. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services. 2020;**53**:101767. DOI: 10.1016/j. jretconser.2019.01.016

[16] Fiske J. The cultural economy of fandom. In: Lewis LA, editor. The Adoring Audience. New York: Routledge; 2002. pp. 30-49

[17] Pearson R. Fandom in the digital era. Popular Communication. 2010;**8**(1):84- 95. DOI: 10.1080/15405700903502346

[18] Jaakkola E, Alexander M. The role of customer engagement behavior in value co-creation: A service system perspective. Journal of Service Research. 2014;**17**(3):247-261. DOI: 10.1177/1094670514529187

[19] Reysen S, Branscombe NR. Fanship and fandom: Comparisons between sport and non-sport fans. Journal of Sport Behavior. 2010;**33**(2):176-193

[20] Laffan DA. Positive psychosocial outcomes and fanship in K-pop fans: A social identity theory perspective. Psychological Reports. 2021;**124**(5):2272-2285. DOI: 10.1177%2F0033294120961524

[21] Seligman MEP. Flourish: A Visionary New Understanding of Happiness and Well-Being. New York: Free Press; 2011

[22] Medvedev ON, Landhuis CE. Exploring constructs of wellbeing, happiness and quality of life. PeerJ. 2018;**6**:e4903. DOI: 10.7717%2Fpeerj.4903

[23] Raibley JR. Happiness is not wellbeing. Journal of Happiness Studies. 2012;**13**(6):1105-1129

[24] Ryff CD. Happiness is everything, or is it? Explorations on the meaning

of psychological well-being. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 1989;**57**(6):1069

[25] Butler J, Kern ML. The PERMAprofiler: A brief multidimensional measure of flourishing. International Journal of Wellbeing. 2016;**6**(3):1-48. DOI: 10.5502/ijw.v6i3.526

[26] Kotler P. What consumerism means for marketers. Harvard Business Review. 1971;**50**(3):48-57

[27] Bauer MA, Wilkie JE, Kim JK, Bodenhausen GV. Cuing consumerism: Situational materialism undermines personal and social well-being. Psychological Science. 2012;**23**(5):517- 523. DOI: 10.1177/0956797611429579

[28] Sweeting H, Hunt K, Bhaskar A. Consumerism and wellbeing in early adolescence. Journal of Youth Studies. 2012;**15**(6):802-820. DOI: 10.1080/13676261.2012.685706

[29] Kucuk SU. Consumerism in the digital age. Journal of Consumer Affairs. 2016;**50**(3):515-538. DOI: 10.1111/ joca.12101

[30] Lane RE. The road not taken: Friendship, consumerism, and happiness. Critical Review. 1994;**8**(4): 521-554. DOI: 10.1080/0891381<PHONE_NUMBER>

# **Chapter 20**

# Thanks for Asking! How UAE-Based University Students Conceptualize Happiness and How Institutions Can Improve It

*Louise Lambert, Yasmeen Khadri, Suhina Mayet, Jessica Vedanayagam, Vaishnavi Varma and Kevin S. Kertechian*

# **Abstract**

How happiness is defined depends on who is asked. In the case of universities, student happiness should prevail, yet their voices are often overlooked. This is also the case in the research literature where non-Western views are less frequently reflected. The United Arab Emirates (UAE), a country whose population is comprised of nearly 90% expatriate residents, is a good study case as campuses are filled with international students and the wellbeing of residents is a national priority. Responses from 80 UAE-based expatriate students reveal they are happiest with friends and in social activities and interactions; they want more opportunities to connect socially in classrooms and campuses, efforts which can be crafted by faculty. They also want joyful, inspiring learning where they can discuss and be exposed to other views, with many driven by the need to feel productive, efficacious and engaged. Solutions included the need for faculty to develop warmer student relationships, the maintenance of online learning to reflect realities of work and relationships, and for students to be treated with more respect as fee-paying adults. As the number of international students rise, research into their happiness and what universities can do to increase it remains a global priority.

**Keywords:** happiness, university, institutions, students, qualitative, belonging, social connections

# **1. Introduction**

University is a time of transition; greater independence and less oversight mark the social, learning, and emotional worlds of young adults. With freedom to make life choices, have fun, and choose one's friends, there is also more isolation and stress, financial worry, and learning struggles [1–3]. Early adulthood's slope is slippery; many young people thrive, but some flounder, and others even suffer. Indeed, mental health is taxed upon university entrance with depression, anxiety, and stress peaking around the age of 25 [4–6]. In the Middle East/North Africa region, depression and

anxiety in young people are higher than global averages [7, 8] and the prevalence of mental health issues is growing with implications for learning, quality of life, relationships and future work outcomes.

Yet, greater than the mere absence of illbeing, the presence of wellbeing is also conducive to a good life. Young people who experience greater life satisfaction and more frequent experiences of positive emotion are more likely to attain a postsecondary degree, search for work, be hired and promoted, as well as get a higher salary [9–11]. Studies conducted in schools and universities show that greater wellbeing boosts learning by as much as 6 months of additional learning and reduces the chances of poor performance [12–15]. Greater wellbeing also spells fewer mental health issues such as depression, loneliness, and anxiety into adulthood [16, 17]. More than simply "nice to have", wellbeing is protective as well as promotive of good living, social relating and learning.

Still, wellbeing is often positioned as the responsibility of counseling departments alone and often takes the form of consumable skills and awareness raising initiatives [1, 3, 18]. By construing the psychosocial needs of students as individual mental health issues, institutions avoid the responsibility of building positive ecosystems. Yet, with local stigma around help-seeking and poorly resourced mental health services [19, 20], alongside post-COVID learning losses and weak performance on university exams more generally [21, 22], and ongoing future economic and employment uncertainty, learning institutions must and can do more [2, 3, 23–25]. Further, as many countries are now focused on wellbeing as a national priority, as is the case in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) where this study is situated, educational institutions have additional incentive to meet this national aim, although universities have been slow to adopt the view that wellbeing matters. Knowing what students perceive as helpful is necessary. Comprised of nearly 90% expatriates, the UAE is a hub for university students. Soliciting their views can help pave the way towards developing more responsive institutions.

### **1.1 "Positive universities": more than learning and profit**