Similar but different: Uncovering the multiple pathways to life satisfaction in Asia

Abstract

© 2020 Institute of Social Development and Policy Research, Seoul National University.Employing social surveys conducted in three East Asian and four Southeast Asian countries, this study examines the pathways by which individuals' well-being and life satisfaction are shaped and makes a cross-regional comparison. Past studies on well-being and life satisfaction have largely neglected to show the complex interdependencies and chain of effects between well-being components and their determinants from a holistic standpoint. Taking advantage of the relatively novel empirical strategy of Bayesian network analysis, this study uncovers the conditional dependency structure of multidimensional social well-being and its regional heterogeneity with regards to how well-being is determined in a processual manner. Results show that regions in East and Southeast Asia share some commonalities, but there are key differences in how individuals' well-being is determined. We propose a compensatory mechanism hypothesis to explain the difference; various economic and relational mechanisms are developed and they effectively make up for the low level of baseline life satisfaction in East Asia.