IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jmathe/v10y2022i3p367-d733450.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

European Citizens’ Happiness: Key Factors and the Mediating Effect of Quality of Life, a PLS Approach

Author

Listed:
  • Nuria Huete-Alcocer

    (Department of Spanish and International Economics, Econometrics and History and Economic Institution, University of Castilla-La Mancha, 02071 Albacete, Spain)

  • Víctor-Raúl López-Ruiz

    (Department of Spanish and International Economics, Econometrics and History and Economic Institution, University of Castilla-La Mancha, 02071 Albacete, Spain)

  • José Luis Alfaro-Navarro

    (Department of Political Economy and Public Finance, Economic and Business Statistics and Economic Policy, University of Castilla-La Mancha, 02071 Albacete, Spain)

  • Domingo Nevado-Peña

    (Department Business Administration, University of Castilla-La Mancha, 13071 Ciudad Real, Spain)

Abstract

Happiness is a very important aspect in the life and well-being of all citizens; as such, it has become a key factor in personal preferences. For these reasons, it is relevant to study what factors principally affect the happiness of the population. However, the difficulties involved in measuring this concept mean that there are no clear criteria as to which aspects should be promoted in order for citizens to achieve greater happiness. This paper uses variance-based structural equation modelling (SEM)—partial least squares path modelling (PLS)—to analyse the direct and indirect effects of European citizens’ assessment of different aspects of their city related to safety, environmental quality and urban planning on their happiness. The source of information used in this study is the Flash Eurobarometer 419 prepared by Eurostat in 2015, with a total of 9799 observations. The results show how quality of life, safety, the environment and city planning have a positive and significant influence on European citizens’ happiness, especially safety. In addition, quality of life acts as a mediating variable, primarily increasing the influence of urban planning on happiness. The findings of the study point to the relevant policies that governments should undertake to ensure the happiness of their citizens.

Suggested Citation

  • Nuria Huete-Alcocer & Víctor-Raúl López-Ruiz & José Luis Alfaro-Navarro & Domingo Nevado-Peña, 2022. "European Citizens’ Happiness: Key Factors and the Mediating Effect of Quality of Life, a PLS Approach," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 10(3), pages 1-18, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jmathe:v:10:y:2022:i:3:p:367-:d:733450
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2227-7390/10/3/367/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2227-7390/10/3/367/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Mousazadeh Hossein, 2022. "Environmental Social Science and Urban Environment Management: A Review of Pathways Linking Policies and Planning to Citizens Living by the River," Quaestiones Geographicae, Sciendo, vol. 41(4), pages 127-139, December.
    2. Mercedes Rubio-Andrés & Ma del Mar Ramos-González & Santiago Gutiérrez-Broncano & Miguel Ángel Sastre-Castillo, 2022. "Creating Financial and Social Value by Improving Employee Well-Being: A PLS-SEM Application in SMEs," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 10(23), pages 1-16, November.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jmathe:v:10:y:2022:i:3:p:367-:d:733450. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.