Test to assess your satisfaction with life (SWLS)

The test to assess your satisfaction with life (SWLS) continues to be the most used instrument to know our level of happiness. Created in the 80s by psychologists Ed Diener, Robert A. Emmons, Randy J. Larsen and Sharon Griffin, it stands as a very interesting resource to obtain reliable information on the level of satisfaction of adults, adolescents and different social groups of any kind. country and culture.

Confucius said that where there is satisfaction there are no revolutions. This idea contains within itself a truth and also a problem. The truth is that, When you feel good about who you are and what you have, there is no need to look or do anything else.. However, as we well know, something like this is not always easy to achieve; Therefore, people are almost always forced to start small or large revolutions to surround ourselves with that longed-for well-being.

Having scales like this test allows us, among other things, to know what is wrong in a society. Also, understand what areas of our life we ​​need to explore, work on or mature. Therefore, we could say that satisfaction, more than a state, is a process in continuous construction; Therefore, having this resource is of great help, both for the area of ​​psychological intervention and in any social research scenario.

Let’s delve into this test to find out what it consists of.

Features, application and reliability

How could we define satisfaction with life? The topic is not simple. There are those who would go ahead and say that this state is achieved with a good job and a checking account. Others would point out that happiness is next to the person we love and who loves us. In this sense, nothing is as subjective, particular and singular as one’s own satisfaction.

Each mind is a world and each world a microuniverse inhabited by needs, priorities, tastes and anxieties. Frederic Bartlett, an experimental psychologist at the University of Cambridge, said that our lives are made by thoughts and everyone can be living in paradise or hell even if they have the same bank account as the richest man in the world.

Therefore, when evaluating this dimension, Ed Diener, Robert A. Emmons, Randy J. Larsen and Sharon Griffin were clear that they had to raise a series of very general questions that went beyond material and even emotional aspects. Hence the test to assess your satisfaction with life (SWLS) is based on cognitive judgmentsin what each person, within their particularity, values ​​that they have achieved or not.

What does the test to assess your satisfaction with life (SWLS)?

This test consists of 5 items (questions) that the person must answer based on a likert scale, that is, 5 types of response ranging from “strongly disagree, agree, neutral, agree, to strongly agree.” As we can see, the test to assess your satisfaction with life (SWLS) is one of the shortest, but this does not mean that it is easy to perform.

Somehow, as we confront those questions that Ed Diener, Robert A. Emmons, Randy J. Larsen and Sharon Griffin first posed to us in 1985 through the Journal of Personality Assessment, It forces us to reflect on very deep aspects of our lives. Being honest is the most important thing in this instrument. Only then will we be clear about our starting point to continue working on our well-being, on that happiness that comes precisely from our own satisfaction with what we are and what we have achieved.

Test questions to assess our life satisfaction

As we have pointed out, this instrument is based on five very specific questions. They are the following:

1. In most aspects my life is the way I want it to be.2. The circumstances of my life are very good.3. I am satisfied with my life.4. So far I have achieved the things in life that I consider important5. If I could live my life again I wouldn’t change a thing.

Is the test to assess your satisfaction with life (SWLS) reliable?

The Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS) was not developed to evaluate aspects such as health, finances, emotional relationships, etc. It is an instrument that measures very subjective realities represented in five items. It is possible that at first glance it raises certain doubts. Can you really know with this test if a person is satisfied with what their reality is like at the present moment?

The answer is yes”. Studies, such as the one carried out by Dr. William Pavot, from the University of Minnesota, show us that this is a test with good validity compared to other scales that evaluate the same dimension. Furthermore, the SWLS allows us to assess how the person’s life satisfaction progresses during the course of a clinical intervention. We are, therefore, facing a highly reliable, useful and very interesting resource in the psychological and research field..

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