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Beliefs about Attainment of Life Satisfaction as Determinants of Preferences for Everyday Activities

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Understanding Economic Behaviour

Part of the book series: Theory and Decision Library ((TDLA,volume 11))

Abstract

The assumption has been made that life satisfaction depends on the attainment of psychological values such as, for instance, feelings of security, freedom, and accomplishment. A related question investigated in the present study is whether the type of everyday activities in which people engage, and which are related to their patterns of consumption, are seen as means by which such psychological values are attained.

A questionnaire was distributed to a heterogeneous group of 112 subjects who first rated how important for life satisfaction they believed the performance of a sample of everyday activities and the attainment of a number of psychological values to be, then indicated for each activity whether or not it facilitated (or hindered) the attainment of each value. In support of the hypothesis, positive correlations were found for individual subjects between the rated importance of the activities, on the one hand, and the importance predicted on the basis of the values believed to be attained by the activities, on the other.

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© 1989 Kluwer Academic Publishers

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Gärling, T., Lindberg, E., Montgomery, H. (1989). Beliefs about Attainment of Life Satisfaction as Determinants of Preferences for Everyday Activities. In: Grunert, K.G., Ölander, F. (eds) Understanding Economic Behaviour. Theory and Decision Library, vol 11. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-2470-3_3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-2470-3_3

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Print ISBN: 978-94-010-7614-2

  • Online ISBN: 978-94-009-2470-3

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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