Social Capital, Subjective Well-Being, and Happiness: Evidence from a Survey in Various European and Asian Countries to Address the Stiglitz Report

摘要

The quantification of happiness is gaining attentionas one of the new social indicators for measuring the degree of development, asput forward in the Stiglitz Report . Various happiness determinants, including (non-)socio-economic factors, have been proposed. Among these, we explored social capital (SC),which refers to human networks as capital. However, methodology to measure SC inclusivelyis still under developed. We used the Resource Generator to ask aboutquasi-resources in human networks in order to measure participants’ SC. Weadministered a survey in the general public in Japan and seven other countries:Denmark, Sweden, Switzerland, Finland, Bhutan, Indonesia, and Singapore. Theresults showed, first, that a correlation between happiness and SC could beidentified in Denmark, Finland, Singapore, and Japan but less so in Sweden,Switzerland, Bhutan, and Indonesia. Second, the countries showed both identicaland different characteristics in SC. Third, SC revealed common aspects thataffected happiness in each country. Mental support, spending leisure time withothers, and one’s career were common determinants of SC that contributed tohappiness in most of the countries, though some exceptions were found.