Materialism: The road to happiness and life satisfaction among Singaporeans
Journal Title: The Journal of Happiness and Well-Being - Year 2015, Vol 3, Issue 1
Abstract
Overseas research studies suggest that shopping can be utilised to establish individual identity and accord social recognition. In Singapore, shopping, an activity associated with materialism, is called a national pastime. Yet, only a handful of research studies have deliberated the roles of happiness and materialism in achieving life satisfaction compared to countries in the west. This study investigated whether materialism and happiness aid life satisfaction in Singapore. A New Materialism Scale was utilised to conduct a more holistic understanding of materialism, as scales utilised in earlier studies have not successfully explained consumer behaviour in recent years. For this study, 128 Singaporean undergraduates (69.5% female; 30.5% male) with a mean age of 21.82 years (SD= 2.17; age range 18-30), enrolled in the Psychology and Business programs at James Cook University, Singapore, were recruited. Results suggest that students between 18 and 30 relate material distinctiveness positively to life satisfaction; male respondents are as equally materialistic as female respondents; material success is most associated with Chinese students; material distinctiveness is linked to Indian students, while happiness levels moderate materialism levels and life satisfaction. An important implication of this study is the finding that there exists more to materialism in relation to life satisfaction and happiness among Singaporeans.
Authors and Affiliations
Jasdeep Kaur Sidhu| James Cook University Department of Psychology, E-mail: koong.foo@my.jcu.edu.au, Koong Hean Foo| James Cook University Department of Psychology
Keywords
Related Articles
- EP ID EP15933
- DOI -
- Views 424
- Downloads 22
Exploring the relationship between compassion, closeness, trust, and social support in same-sex friendships
The aim of this exploratory study was to explore the relationship between self-compassion, other-compassion, closeness, trust, and social support, and to determine whether there were gender differences between variables...
Psychometric properties of Turkish version of the Subjective Happiness Scale
The Subjective Happiness Scale (SHS) is a scale developed to evaluate the global subjective happiness. The objective of this study is to examine the psychometric properties of the Turkish version of SHS in a community...
The Turkish adaptation of Compassion Scale: The validity and reliability study
The purpose of this study was to adapt Compassion Scale (CS) developed by Pommier (2011) into Turkish and to examine its reliability and validity. Data was collected from four different study groups involving a total o...
Turkish version of the Short Depression-Happiness Scale (SDHS): A validity and reliability study
The current study aims to adapt the Short Depression-Happiness Scale (SDHS) to Turkish culture and to investigate the psychometric characteristics of this scale. There were 380 respondents (179 female/199 male) ranging...
Influence of internet usage on social and subjective well-being of Sri Lankan GLIS
The majority of the inventors in developing countries is independent inventors work on inventions by their own interest. The Internet has been one of the leading knowledge repositories for these independent inventors t...