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The Validity of Subjective Wellbeing Measurement for Children: Evidence Using the Personal Wellbeing Index—School Children

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Abstract

Research is scarce concerning the validity of subjective wellbeing measures for children aged 12 years and less. There are even fewer subjective wellbeing data for children with complex backgrounds and personal circumstances and those experiencing socio-demographic disadvantage. This study compares the psychometric properties of the child and adult versions of the Personal Wellbeing Index. Participants were 1761 ‘at-risk’ children aged 10–12 years, and 2000 geographically representative Australian adults. While there was sufficient fit with a one-factor structure, the reliability estimates were lower in the child sample and the incidence of response bias was significantly higher. Collectively, these findings suggest caution in the use of subjective wellbeing measures with children.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Psychology, Counselling and Psychotherapy, Cairnmillar Institute, Melbourne, Australia

    Adrian J. Tomyn

  2. School of Psychology, Deakin University, Burwood, Australia

    Matthew D. Fuller-Tyszkiewicz & Robert A. Cummins

  3. Department of Business and Economics, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia

    Jacolyn M. Norrish

Authors
  1. Adrian J. Tomyn
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  2. Matthew D. Fuller-Tyszkiewicz
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  3. Robert A. Cummins
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  4. Jacolyn M. Norrish
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Adrian J. Tomyn.

Appendices

Appendix 1

See Table 4.

Table 4 Breakdown of extreme high responding by age and item
Full size table

Appendix 2

See Table 5, 6, 7.

Table 5 Confirmatory factor analysis for each child and adult group (inc. extreme responders)
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Table 6 Means, standard deviations and correlations between parallel versions of the PWI domains and GLH/GLS (inc. extreme responders)
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Table 7 Predicting GLH/GLS using the seven domains of the PWI (inc. extreme responders)
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Tomyn, A.J., Fuller-Tyszkiewicz, M.D., Cummins, R.A. et al. The Validity of Subjective Wellbeing Measurement for Children: Evidence Using the Personal Wellbeing Index—School Children. J Happiness Stud 18, 1859–1875 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-016-9804-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-016-9804-3

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