Subjective Well‐Being and Health Behaviors in 2.5 Million Americans

Abstract

Background Happiness and health behavior are positively related, but most existing research does not distinguish between conceptually and empirically distinct components of subjective well‐being—satisfaction with life, positive affect, and negative affect. Method We assessed the associations of each component of subjective well‐being and health behavior, such as exercising and not smoking, in a broad, representative sample of nearly 2.5 million respondents from the USA in the Gallup Daily Poll. Results We found that both life satisfaction and positive affect, but not negative affect, are unique predictors of health behavior, even after controlling for a wide range of variables, including demographics, chronic illness, daily stress and pain, and other relevant factors. Positive affect was linearly related to health behavior, while life satisfaction showed an association only for individuals relatively satisfied with their lives (but not for those dissatisfied with their lives). These associations were not moderated by various factors, occurring across gender and age, personal resources like time and money, and environmental affordances such as access to fresh food and safe places to exercise. Conclusions The relationship between well‐being and health behavior is robust and generalisable in a large cross‐section of the US population.

Financial Literacy and Exercise Behavior: Evidence from Japan

“…However, our finding that frequent gambling does not have a significant relationship with exercise is inconsistent with Håkansson et al [86], who found a positive association between problem gambling and physical activity. Among the behavioral variables, our finding on the positive association of happiness level with regular exercise is consistent with other studies [87][88][89][90]. Intuitively, people with a high level of happiness are more likely to have energy and feel less fatigue than people with depression or a low level of happiness.…”

Evaluation of Mood Check-in Feature for Participation in Meditation Mobile App Users: Retrospective Longitudinal Analysis

“…We were not able to determine whether the benefits of mood check-ins come from individuals consciously deciding to meditate based on their mood or if this effect occurs on a subconscious level. If occurring subconsciously, the meditation behavior may be a byproduct of improvements in mental health that are associated with better health behaviors [ 21 - 23 ]. Alternatively, mood check-ins may increase the perceived benefit of meditation, and thus increase performance of the behavior.…”

How does exercising make you feel? The associations between positive and negative affect, life satisfaction, self-esteem, and vitality

“…Another important aspect of well-being is life satisfaction. Research in the past years has made considerable progress in identifying the factors that influence people's subjective well-being all around the world (Diener et al, 1985;Kuppens et al, 2008;Kushlev et al, 2020). Scholars have distinguished two components of well-being: cognitive one related to the evaluation of the satisfaction with one's life as a whole, and an affective judgement that refers to positive and negative emotionality (Kuppens et al, 2008), which is going to be examined in this research, as we intend to examine the relationship of positive and negative affect, and life satisfaction.…”