Authors

• de Paola, Jennifer (University of Helsinki. Faculty of Social Sciences)

Keywords

emotional states, happiness, psychological well-being, satisfaction, women

Abstract

The survey charted young Finnish women's views on happiness and the opposite of happiness. The data consist of responses from two age groups: 16 - 19 years old (N: 227) and 29 - 34 years old (N: 189). The data are mostly available in English, but other related materials such as the questionnaires are in Finnish.

The young women's views on happiness were examined with a word association task. The respondents were first asked to think about the word 'happiness' and write down the first five words or thoughts that came to their mind. Then, the respondents were asked to write down the first five words or thoughts that came to mind when they thought about the opposite of happiness. The words the respondents wrote down during the two word association tasks are included in the data in English and Finnish (e.g. in q1_1: family = perhe).

After the word association task, the respondents were asked to complete several sentences that related to happiness. The topics of the sentences surveyed the respondents' own happiness as well as their assumptions regarding the happiness of men and women in general. Finally, the respondents evaluated their own happiness and the happiness of other women in a similar life situation on a scale 0-10.

Background variables included the respondent's age, citizenship/nationality, municipality of residence, household composition, degree of religiosity, and whether the respondent felt that one or more people she knew were her good friends. Additionally, some background variables specific to the two age groups were included.