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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Psychol.
Sec. Positive Psychology
Volume 15 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1478726
This article is part of the Research Topic Well-being in Asia View all 11 articles

Quality of Life in Provinces in Indonesia As measured with Happy Life Years

Provisionally accepted
  • 1 Universitas Negeri Yogyakarta, Indonesia, Yogyakarta, Indonesia
  • 2 Erasmus University Rotterdam, Rotterdam, Netherlands
  • 3 North-West University, Potchefstroom, North West, South Africa

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    There is a growing interest in quality of life in places, such as nations, regions and cities. Individuals want to know about that when deciding where to live while policy makers want to know whether the quality of life in the area could is better or worse than in other areas and has improved or declined over time. Quality of life in an area can be measured by the presence of conditions deemed beneficial (assumed quality of life) and by how well people flourish there (apparent quality of life).Apparent quality of life in an area can be measured by how long and happy people live there. This approach was applied to the 34 provinces in Indonesia. Survey data on happiness were combined with register data on longevity in an index of Happy Life Years (HLY). Scores on this index range from 59 happy life years in Kalimantan Timur to 47 in Papua Barat. We mainly use correlational analysis to test the index. Some 59% of these differences in apparent quality of life can be explained by regional economic development, economic competitiveness, democracy and absence of corruption, while income-inequality does not explain the differences. An agenda for further research is suggested.

    Keywords: Happy life years, Well-being, happiness, Indonesia, Living conditions

    Received: 10 Aug 2024; Accepted: 22 Oct 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Pierewan and Veenhoven. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Ruut Veenhoven, Erasmus University Rotterdam, Rotterdam, Netherlands

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.