Component Dimensions of Happiness An Exploratory Study

By Vaishali Marathe

This chapter attempts to describe in detail the various variables of the study. The conceptual framework gives a scientific structure to the presentation of the variables along with the related concepts, theories, beliefs and ideas. The chapter describes the variables of the study like gender, marital status, age and happiness. Apart from the co

• Language: English
• Publisher: sobia
• Release date: Jan 23, 2023
• ISBN: 9781805459422

Book preview

CONSTITUENT DIMENSIONS OF HAPPINESS:

AN EXPLORATORY STUDY

VAISHALI MARATHE

CONTENTS

CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER 2

REVIEW OF LITERATURE

CHAPTER 3

RESEARCH METHOD

CHAPTER 4

RESULTS

CHAPTER 5

DISCUSSION

CHAPTER 6

SUMMARY, CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS

CHAPTER 7

IMPLICATIONS

CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Conceptual Framework and Variate

Structure

1.2 Rationale of the Study

1.3 Objectives of the Study

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This chapter attempts to describe in detail the various variables of the study. The conceptual framework gives a scientific structure to the presentation of the variables along with the related concepts, theories, beliefs and ideas. The chapter describes the variables of the study like gender, marital status, age and happiness. Apart from the conceptual framework, this chapter also presents the rationale and the objectives of the study.

1.1. Conceptual Framework and Variate Structure

1.1.1 Gender

Although the terms sex and gender are used interchangeably, there is contextual difference between the two. While the term sex refers to the physiological differences between the male and the female, gender outlines the difference between the two in socio-cultural context. WHO defines gender as roles, behaviours, activities, attributes and opportunities that any society considers appropriate for girls and boys, and women and men. Gender interacts with, but is different from the binary categories of biological sex (www.who.int/health-topics/gender). Gender roles are assigned by society as a whole, based on the beliefs and attitudes about behavior that are considered acceptable from an individual based on his or her gender. This includes what people wear, how they talk, their educational pursuits, careers that they follow and the parental roles that they play, with the father generally expected to be the bread-winner and the mother, the nurturer.

Looking at these societal expectations in the Indian context, we see for example that in North India, men are expected to wear turbans for all formal occasions, while women are expected to cover their heads in the presence of elders. In South India, married women

gender roles to stereotyping is but a short step. Gender stereotyping is one of the most common biases observed in the society. The Office of the High Commissioner, United Natio

attributes or characteristics, or roles that are or ought to be possessed by or performed 1

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capacity to develop their personal abilities, pursue their professional careers and make (w

ww.ohchr.org.)

In most societies gender stereotyping takes root from a very early age. The ways in which little boys and girls are dressed is different, their toys are different, and the games that they play are different too. Masculine and feminine traits too are expected to be different. Men are expected to be assertive, decision makers, leaders, logical and strong.

In many cultures, women are still expected to be submissive, followers, emotional and dependent. While laws across countries prohibit gender discrimination at places of work, women are still fighting for equal opportunities. Gender pay disparity is an ongoing battle, and the number of women on the top rungs of the corporate ladder is abysmally low.

Women portrayed in print advertisements were found to be generally in decorative roles, especially advertisements for hedonic products (Plakoyiannaki & Zotos, 2009).

Also, female stereotypes that are portrayed were found to depend on the product under advertisement. In television advertisements too, women are depicted to be young, dependent, nurturing and stay-at-home (Kim & Lowry, 2005). In a study o

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generally depicted as indifferent parents. It was mothers who were depicted as having most contact with children, to be feeding and nurturing them and being more emotionally expressive.

Stewart & McDermott (2003) found that research in psychology focused on gender as a concept in three ways i) in differentiating between males and females in terms of differences in socio-biological aspects like behavior and performance, ii) how difference in gender might coincide with other intra-group differences among men and women, and iii) how gender contributes to social institutions within which both men and women function. While women were found to outperform men in academic studies (Castagnetti & Rosti, 2009), they lagged behind in the labour market. Their superior degree scores are attributed primarily to greater individual effort that female students exert as compared to male. A study in Turkey found that lesser number of female 2

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students managed to enter university, but once admitted, they outperformed the male students and excelled in their studies.

Men and women were found to have different approaches to job satisfaction. While women found non-monetary factors like their work, co-workers and working environment contributing largely to job satisfaction, men linked job satisfaction mainly to monetary factors like pay and promotion (Okpara et al., 2005, Linz & Semykina, 2013). Women were also found to have fewer job challenges, but the reason could be that basically, supervisors allocate less challenging tasks to female employees (Pater et al., 2010)

Description of gender would not be c

h ad no legal recognition. Members of this community lived on the fringes of society, ostracized because they did not fall in the male / female binary, and had no regular or formal means of earning livelihood. They were forced to earn by singing and dancing at festivals and family celebrations. In a landmark ruling in 2014, the Supreme Court of India ordered the government to recognize the rights of transgenders and provide them with quota for jobs and education, along the lines provided to minorities.

Ironically, transgenders find respectable mention in the Manusmriti, Ramayana and Mahabharata (Wadhwa, 2018). Even in pre-colonial era, they were treated respectably.

Their stigmatization started during the British Colonial rule when gender was neatly fit 1.1.2 Marital Status

on m

ost legal and official documents. Marriage here means that the two individuals are tied together in a legally binding relationship. The most common examples of marital status are married, single, divorced and widowed. According to the website of the Press Information Bureau, Government of India (www.pib.gov.in), the Census of 2011

showed that currently, the proportion of married women is 49.9 percent, while 46

percent of men are married. The percentage of widowed women is 7.4 percent, while 3

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that of widowed men is 2 percent. A report published in the Deccan Herald in August 2016 based on the Census 2011 states that out of the 48.97 lakh people who are divorced or separated, a whopping 67.02 percent are women.

In India, especially according to Hindu philosophy, marriage is not just a legal ritu

als. It is also looked upon as an insoluble bond between two people that lasts not just the present lifetime, but for many lifetimes to come. Traditionally, in India, just family, in earlier times, even without the consent of the bride and the groom! Then, as a result of Western influence, industrialization and urbanization, young people started choosing their own spouses, and the practice of arranged marriage is undergoing a change. Allendorf & Pandian (2016) observe that the practice of arranged marriages in India is shifting, rather than declining. They observe some changes in the last few as

their meetings and interactions before the marriage. Consanguineous marriages have decreased and inter-caste marriages have increased. However, the pace of change is slow. The authors conclude that arranged marriages are not going to become obsolete in India any time soon.

Once a taboo in India, attitude towards divorce has undergone a big change in recent years. Divorce rate has gone up, especially in urban areas. Thadathil & Sriram (2019) analyze fourteen studies from 2000 to 2018 to understand the causes and effects of divorce in India. They found that common causes for divorce include harassment by husband and his family, domestic violence, dowry, patriarchy, infidelity, poor communication and lack of physical intimacy. The distressing effects of divorce were found to be development of psychological problems in women like anxiety, depression, anger and a feeling of incompetence. They also experienced social stigma. Children, of

moving from the current home and school resulted in feelings of confusion, anger, alienation and self-blame, which in turn led to behavioural problems.

A similar exercise was earlier carried out by Lowenstein (2005), where he reviewed studies from various developed countries and summarized the major causes of divorce.

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They were found to be

poor intellectual and economic and social skills, liberal divorce laws, role conflicts, alcoholism and religious factors. The consequences of divorce were also outlined. It was found that as a result of the divorce, the role of the father was considerably diminished. Children of divorced parents were found to have greater adjustment issues and eventually, as adults, became wary of commitment in relationships. Men, after divorce, typically experienced a decline in living conditions.

In order to draw attention to the needs of widows and to garner support for them, the United nations has marked 23rd

life partner is a tragic loss for anyone, but it takes a greater toll on women, mainly due to social and economic reasons. In India, social stigma around widowhood, especially for women is prevalent even today. Widows are implicitly or explicitly discouraged from remarrying. They are also subject to a wide range of deprivations in terms of food and nutrition, money, quality of life, attire and social interactions (Lloyd-Sherlock et al., 2015). They were also found to be discriminated against in terms of household allocation of resources and property settlements.

There are also some psychological effects of widowhood, irrespective of gender.

Loneliness is one of the biggest challenges of widowhood. In fact, widowhood was found to be the most significant predictor of loneliness, irrespective of educational level and gender, and could increase the probability of loneliness by 193 percent (Yang, 2020). Widowhood was also found to affect cognitive functioning in older US

population (Shin et al., 2018). Experience of widowhood in later life was found to be significantly associated with cognitive decline which continued in subsequent years.

However, there was a protective effect of having completed high school education and having living siblings on cognitive decline.

Today, while describing marriage, one cannot but include the concept of cohabitation

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nships, where an unrelated couple lives together as man and wife without entering into the legal contract of marriage. While Indian society still frowns upon this, an increasing number of people are embracing this option for a number of reasons to test compatibility, inability to assume fixed financial responsibility, awaiting career stability, religious reasons or sheer cynicism towards the institution of 5

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marriage. In India, live-in relationships gained legal recognition in 2010 (Dholam, 2015) under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005, thus ensuring maintenance and other security benefits to the female partner. Children born under such an alliance are also recognized under the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955.

The United States of America has a varied take on cohabitation. Some states, for example Washington, extend most benefits of marriage to those living in cohabitant relationships, while other states like Illinois do not recognize such relationships at all (Bowman, 2004). Premarital cohabitation rates as well as duration started to rise in the US in the 1970s, with records showing that during 2011-2015 almost 70 percent of first marriages started with the couple co-habiting (Kuperberg, 2018). Since marriage is probably the most fundamental social institution, it plays a crucial role in various health, happiness, behavior, morale, mortality, family the

most important demographic variables.

1.1.3 Age

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wever, this is just a basic understanding of age as a chronological variable the amount of time one has spent on this earth, quantified in terms of years. Age, though, is a far more complex concept than the chronological definition. Hence, it is important to look at age from different perspectives - biological, legal, mental, social and developmental.

Biological age: While chronological age takes into consideration only the number of years a person has been living, biological age, or physiological age takes into consideration a number of factors chronological age, lifestyle, nutrition, exercise, illness and genetic factors. Thus, a 26-year-old who eats unhealthy food, smokes, drinks alcohol and lives a sedentary life would have a biological age which is greater than 26

years, and a fit 60-year-old with a healthy lifestyle would have a biological age which is less than 60 years.

Mental Age: Mental Age is a concept coined by Alfred Binet in 1905. It is related to the 6

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person, usually a child, achieves on an individual or a series of performance tests, as compared to the average score achieved by other people of the same age on the same fo

r which is Mental Age (MA) / Chronological Age (CA) x 100. If the Mental Age was the same as Chronological Age the IQ would be equal to 100. If Mental Age was higher than Chronological Age, the IQ would be greater than 100, thus indicating a higher level of intelligence. However, IQ as the sole predictor of success has long been considered outdated. Equal, if not more, importance is now given to the role of also found, in a study conducted on children who grew in foster care, that Emotional Intelligence rather than General Intelligence was a significant predictor of quality of life as well as reduced levels of distress. EI is also more amenable to change, and helps bolster resilience (Kennedy et al., 2019).

Legal Age: Legal age represents the age at which the legislature of the specific country permits an individual to engage in certain activities. Thus, in India, the legal age to drive a non-geared 50 cc engine vehicle is 16 years, while to drive a geared vehicle is 18 years. A person has the right to vote and to enter into a contract upon completing 18

years of age. For marriage, the legal ages are 18 and above for women, and 21 and above for men. As far as alcohol consumption is concerned, the legal ages vary according to states. For some states it is 25, for some it is 21 and for yet others it is 18

years. Age to start working and retiring from work also has legal limits. However, debates, discussions and amendments to legal ages keep happening across countries. In the US for example, between 1970 and 1975, many states lowered the minimum legal drinking age from 21 to 18 years (Cook and Tauchen, 1984). There were two main drivers for this firstly, when 18 year olds were granted the right to vote, it seemed fair to extend other privileges of adulthood to them, and secondly, it was the fact that college-going youths were already drinking, whether they were permitted to do so or not. Currently, there is a discussion on in India to lower the age of consent from 18 to 16 years, as it is in many countries around the world.

Developmental Age: This refers to the age when a person reaches physical and psychological milestones (like talking and walking) compared to the average observed age of reaching these milestones. Various psychologists have studied development in 7

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terms of stages, considering different aspects of development, chiefly physical, cognitive and psycho-social. Some of the most talked about theories of development are those by Freud, Erikson, Piaget and Hurlock.

Freud believed that development happened through psycho-sexual phases. From birth to 1 year is the oral stage, where the basic erogenous zone is the mouth. From age 1 to 3 years is the anal stage, where the erogenous zone is the bladder and bowel control.

The phallic stage is from 3 to 6 years of age, and here the focus is on the genitals. Ages 6 years to puberty is termed as the latency period where sexual feelings are not active.

Finally, puberty to death is termed as the genital stage, where sexual interests have matured. Erikson believed that development takes place through eight psychosocial stages, and a person experiences psychosocial crises unique to the particular stage of development. These crises co

personality. Erikson also believed that the successful resolution of the crises at every Stage Age in years Crisis

Virtue

1

0 to 1 ½

Trust vs Mistrust

Hope

2

1 ½ to 3

Autonomy vs Shame

Will

3

3 to 5

Initiative vs Guilt

Purpose

4

5 to 12

Industry vs Inferiority

Competency

5

12 to 18

Identity vs Role Confusion

Fidelity

6

18 to 40

Intimacy vs Isolation

Love

7

40 to 65

Generativity vs Stagnation

Care

8

65+

Ego Integrity vs Despair

Wisdom

Piaget did not believe that intelligence was