Open Access Open Access  Restricted Access Subscription Access

The Concept of Measuring Happiness and How India Can Go the Nordic Way


Affiliations
1 ICAR Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi - 110 012, India
 

Quantifying subjective well being or happiness has always been intriguing and with the advent of Gross National Happiness (GNH) index of Bhutan and World Happiness Report (WHR) by UN, it has become all the way more of a global issue. This study stratifies countries into Happiness Strata in a Global Happiness Map using the WHR 2018 indices, only to find that India is among the 42 Unhappy Nations of the world. The Nordic (Western European) countries seem to top the happiness charts with Denmark being consistently among the top five. The paper also discusses what India can learn and adopt from Denmark.

Keywords

No Keywords.
User
Notifications
Font Size

  • NCMH, Background papers: Burden of disease in India, Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, New Delhi, 2005.
  • Masand, P., One in five Indians needs mental health counselling, reveals Government statistics. The Times of India, 10 October 2012.
  • Mascarenhas, A., Mental illness India-s ticking bomb, only 1 in 10 treated: Lancet study. The Indian Express, 19 May 2016.
  • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happiness
  • Kalmijn, W. and Veenhoven, R. J., J. Happiness Stud., 2005, 6, 357–396; https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-005-8855-7.
  • Lyubomirsky, S. and Lepper, H. S., Social Indicat. Res., 1999, 46, 137–155.
  • Frey, B. S. and Stutzer, A., Happiness and Economics, Princeton University Press, 2002.
  • Kahneman, D., Diener, E. and Schwarz, N., Well-being: The Foundations of Hedonic Psychology, Russell Sage Foundation, New York, 1999.
  • Taneja, D. K., Indian J. Commun. Med., 2014, 39(2), 68–72.
  • Mohi-Ud-Din, M. and Barthwal, S., Int. J. Sci. Res., 2016, 5(12), 722–724.
  • Hoop, T. D., Kempen, L. V., Linssen, R. and Erdewijk, A. V., Women's autonomy and subjective well-being in India: How village norms shape the impact of selfhelp groups, MPRA, Paper No. 25921, 2010.
  • Fontaine, X. and Yamada, K., World Dev., 2014, 64, 407–419.
  • Linssen, R., Kempen, L. V. and Kraaykamp, G., Soc. Ind. Res., 2011, 101(1), 57–72.
  • Agrawal, J. et al., Soc. Indic. Res., 2011, 101(3), 419–434.
  • The Economic Times, 89 per cent of India's population suffering from stress; most don't feel comfortable talking to medical professionals, 10 July 2018.
  • http://www.educatingforgnh.com
  • http://worldhappiness.report/ed/2018/
  • https://tradingeconomics.com/denmark/ gdp-growth
  • Ura, K., Alkire, S. and Zangmo, T., Case Study: Bhutan Gross National Happiness and the GNH Index. Part II of the World Happiness Report (eds Helliwell, J., Layard, R. and Sachs, J.), Centre for Bhutan Studies, Thimphu, Bhutan, 2010.
  • OECD, Doctors (indicator), 2018; doi: 10.1787/4355e1ec-en
  • World Economic Forum, The Global Gender Gap Report, 2017.
  • Melnick, M., Denmark is considered the happiest country. You-ll never guess why. The Huffington Post, 22 October 2013.
  • Dash, D. K., India loses Rs 60,000 crore due to traffic congestion: study. The Times of India, New Delhi, 31 May 2012.
  • http://www.ivoindia.org/Images/voluntee ring-and-active-citizenship_tcm78-36149.pdf
  • OECD, Health spending (indicator), 2018; doi: 10.1787/8643de7e-en.

Abstract Views: 272

PDF Views: 77




  • The Concept of Measuring Happiness and How India Can Go the Nordic Way

Abstract Views: 272  |  PDF Views: 77

Authors

Sangeeta Bhattacharyya
ICAR Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi - 110 012, India
R. Roy Burman
ICAR Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi - 110 012, India
Sudipta Paul
ICAR Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi - 110 012, India

Abstract


Quantifying subjective well being or happiness has always been intriguing and with the advent of Gross National Happiness (GNH) index of Bhutan and World Happiness Report (WHR) by UN, it has become all the way more of a global issue. This study stratifies countries into Happiness Strata in a Global Happiness Map using the WHR 2018 indices, only to find that India is among the 42 Unhappy Nations of the world. The Nordic (Western European) countries seem to top the happiness charts with Denmark being consistently among the top five. The paper also discusses what India can learn and adopt from Denmark.

Keywords


No Keywords.

References





DOI: https://doi.org/10.18520/cs%2Fv116%2Fi1%2F26-28