Copyright © 2019 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.
A study of the effect of Vipassana meditation practices on employees’ satisfaction with life
Seema Pradhan*
Symbiosis International (Deemed University), Pune, India
and Fortis Hospitals, Bangalore, India
Email: [email protected]
*Corresponding author
Vadakki Veetil Ajithkumar
Skyline University College, University City of Sharjah, Sharjah, UAE
Email: [email protected]
Abstract: Life satisfaction is an individual’s perception about how well their life is progressing. It is an accepted fact that spirituality makes us better human beings. In this empirical study an attempt has been made to study the effect of Vipassana meditation, an ancient meditation technique on the life satisfaction of employees. We have used satisfaction with life scale (SWLS) developed by Diener et al. (1985) to collect data. In total 240 samples were collected from each group of employees namely non-meditator and meditators. Detailed statistical analysis was done using SPSS ver. 20.0. Group differences were tested by t-test and univariate analysis. Results indicate that satisfaction with life scores is higher in case of meditator employees and the scores are independent of demographic factors. Also, the effect of meditation variables on SWLS scores is discussed. The results validate use of Vipassana meditation as an intervention in an organisational setup.
Keywords: demographic factors; employees; life satisfaction; meditation practices; Vipassana meditation.
Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Pradhan, S. and Ajithkumar, V.V. (2019) ‘A study of the effect of Vipassana meditation practices on employees’ satisfaction with life’, Int. J. Public Sector Performance Management, Vol. 5, Nos. 3/4, pp.481–499.
Biographical notes: Seema Pradhan has been practicing Vipassana meditation for the past 18 years. She is currently an Assistant Teacher of Vipassana meditation and a member of the research committee of the Vipassana Research Institute (VRI). She is a Certified Transactional Analyst (CTA, Psychotherapy) and a Professional Psychotherapist and Counselling Psychologist, practicing at the Fortis Hospital, Bangalore since 2006.
Vadakki Veetil Ajithkumar completed his PhD in the area of Industrial Relations and MBA in Human Resource Management from the Andhra University. He has undergone a course on cross cultural management and problem solving from the Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. His research areas are leadership, HR flexibility, business ethics and diversity management. He has conducted many executive programs in the areas of leadership, conflict and negotiation to employees of corporates like Gulf Air, Wipro, etc. He has more than 17 years of teaching experience in reputed business schools like ICFAI, Symbiosis Institute of Business Management in India.
This paper is a revised and expanded version of a paper entitled ‘A study of the effect of Vipassana meditation practices on employees’ satisfaction with life’
presented at SIMSARC 17 Conference, Pune, India, 16 December 2017.
1 Introduction
Today, creature comforts have multiplied many fold as compared to the past. The compensation provided to employees by employers enables them to enjoy an affluent lifestyle. Also, consumers are pampered and overloaded with a host of products promising a high quality life. All this provides materialistic comforts to the population.
However the flip side of this situation is that the people are suffering from increased amount of stress, worry, anxiety, dissatisfaction, jealousy, health issues and an overall dissatisfaction with life. People are unhappy despite having everything at their doorstep.
Thus the saga of man’s pursuit of happiness continues even today.
Philosophers and psychologists have always been interested in the concept of happiness and have talked at length about it. Happiness can be perceived as a pleasant effect one experiences whenever there is a satisfaction of intellectual, physical or social needs (Waterman, 1993). Happiness may also be the outcome of a general satisfaction with one’s life and how it is unfolding. While there is some consensus on which life domains influence life satisfaction, there is also recognition that scoring or weightage attributed to specific domains is an individual’s choice. Some individuals may attribute social contacts a higher weight when compared to say income status and for some others, the opposite may be true. Therefore, any scale used to measure satisfaction with life (SWL) needs to be domain agnostic because individuals will give different weightage to various life events they experience. Life events are happenings in one’s life that change a person’s circumstances. Some of these could be divorce, passing away of a spouse, job loss, to name a few. Life events cause major changes in relationships, impact family as well as work related circumstances, and also affect changes in the kind of recreational and leisure activities a person may engage in. Life events can be classified as those that are expected and hence do not generate a great deal of stress, while others that are sudden and unexpected, causing a person to cope rapidly to the changed circumstances and hence generate greater amount of stress. The range of unexpected life events could be events such as being fired from a job or the death of a near and dear one, as opposed to more mundane events, such as relocating to a new city, which are also problematic in nature.
Different coping strategies are used by individuals to deal with stressful life events and it
has been documented that employees use meditation as a stress relieving mechanism (Nalawade and Pradhan, 2016).
Meditation is often used to strike a balance between the physical, mental, emotional, intellectual and spiritual well-being in the individual. Many philosophical and contemplative practices reinforce that ‘living in the moment’ increases happiness (Brewer et al., 2011; Sandhu, 2007). Meditation has been described as a “technique to actualise and integrate the personality of human beings to fulfilled states of personal integration”
(Ferguson, 1981). Coates (2009) says, “The world’s greatest religions all advise us to engage in self- reflection as a way to gain mastery over the self and its propensity to let emotions cloud reasoning. Mind focusing techniques such as meditation are recommended.” Marques and Dhiman (2009) suggest the use of Vipassana meditation (VM) as a strong means to enhance “workplace well-being through improved communications, efficient meetings, optimum performance, better decisions, and greater understanding.”
A literature review was performed to understand the drivers of life satisfaction and the role played by interventions such as Vipassana or mindfulness meditation keeping in view the objectives of the study.
2 Objectives of the study
1 What is the effect of VM on employees’ SWL?
2 What is the effect of demographic variables on meditator employees’ SWL?
3 What is the effect of meditation variables on meditator employees’ SWL?
3 Literature review 3.1 Definition of SWL
Life satisfaction largely depends on how a person evaluates different life situations and life aspects by perceiving them as favourable or unfavourable and then labels them as good or bad, indicating his/her degree of SWL. Life satisfaction is defined as “a global assessment of a person’s quality of life according to his/her chosen criteria” (Shin and Johnson, 1978). Argyle et al. (1989) said that one of the elements of happiness can be given as the average level of satisfaction over a specific time period. As positive affect (PA) and happiness are emotional aspects and are not cognitive in nature, life satisfaction is not completely described by happiness and PA (Diener et al., 1999). It is useful not to measure life satisfaction with happiness as it is a separate aspect of subjective well-being (SWB), and it correlates differently with well-being predictors (Pavot and Diener, 1993;
Van Beuningen and Kloosterman, 2011). Life satisfaction is a cognitive process which is subjective and judgmental in nature. It is a comparison done by individuals regarding how much they have actually achieved in a certain time frame as against ideally how much they should have achieved in terms of goals, in that same frame of time. People tend to compare themselves to an internal standard they have set, rather than comparing themselves to what others have achieved. Life satisfaction appears to be significantly
determined by health, quality of one’s work and income, that is, factors that are easily accessible to act as yardsticks to evaluate one’s life (Schimmack and Oishi, 2005).
Diener et al. (1997) have proposed SWB as a three dimensional construct:
1 a cognitive aspect
2 the relative absence of negative effect 3 PA.
Life satisfaction is termed as the cognitive facet of SWB. It is a person’s cognitive evaluation of their overall life as well as their assessment of whether their life circumstances are associated with a positive and/or negative feeling (Andrews and Withey, 1976; Arthaud-Day et al., 2005). The cognitive evaluation of life satisfaction is observed to vary across different cultures (Biswas-Diener and Diener, 2001). However, relatedness need for competence and autonomy satisfaction are positively related to life satisfaction irrespective of cultural differences (Church et al., 2013). Also, the fulfilment of basic needs given in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is proportional to higher life satisfaction over majority of the countries (Tay and Diener, 2011).
According to Peterson et al. (2005), there is a direct correlation between the concept of happiness and life satisfaction and it encompasses SWB and quality of life. Number of studies have been undertaken to study happiness (Diener, 2000; Chamorro-Premuzic et al., 2007). Sergin and Taylor (2007) have reported a correlation of 0.62, (p < 0.001) between life satisfaction and happiness. However, Pavot and Diener (1993) recommended that, it is instructive to measure life satisfaction separately from happiness because it is an independent part of overall SWB and it also shows a different correlation with the predictors of SWB.
SWB measures a person’s assessment of how well their life is progressing (Lucas and Donnellan, 2007). SWB is an encompassing term which takes into account evaluation of one’s emotional and life experiences like PA, negative affect (NA) and life satisfaction (Diener et al., 2015). PA represents positive emotions like gratitude, contentment and enjoyment whereas NA represents emotions like sadness, anger and worry. Also as compared to personality, life circumstances as well as events tend to have a surprisingly small effect on SWB (Diener et al., 1991; McCrae and Costa, 1987).
In a research on relationship between emotional intelligence (EI) and happiness, Szczygieł and Mikolajczak (2017) reported that trait EI plays an important role in enhancing SWB and positive emotion regulation mediates the interaction between EI, SWB and life satisfaction. In their research findings, Campbell et al. (1976) have reported that taken together demographic variables have a small effect on SWB. Demographic variables such as age, sex, marital status, work position have a weak relationship with life satisfaction. However, married people reported more SWL and higher life satisfaction was shown by people having lifelong marriages (Evans and Kelly, 2004). Life satisfaction does not depend upon gender (Diener et al., 1999) but at the same time positive and NA variation is more amongst women. Also other variables such as social contacts, degree of intelligence do not strongly impact life satisfaction. Better mental (Beutell, 2006) and physical health (Veenhoven, 1991) longevity and other positive outcomes indicated higher level of life satisfaction.
SWL is an effective method of assessing the impact of conflicts experienced by individuals on their perceptions and feelings about life. Allen et al. (2000) have reported a significant negative relationship between SWL and work-family conflict.
At the same time how people deal with conflicts is also an important determinant.
Mehrotra and Tripathi (2011) used mixed method design in their study on positive psychology and reported that in case of middle aged adults the significant factors contributing to life satisfaction were economic and family matters and it did not depend upon gender, social position and level of education. The study confirmed the findings by Lavalekar (2007) that life satisfaction depends more upon the attitude of the person than the attributes held by him/her. Bhargava (1995) have documented that adults view life satisfaction by taking an average rather than an accumulation of life events.
Robert et al. (2006) used SWB scale to study the relationship between job satisfaction and spiritual well-being of the individual and a positive relationship was observed between the two. Also, perceiving life to be meaningful and satisfaction with one’s life are indicators of spiritual well-being (Rothschild et al., 2017).
Research has shown that there is relatedness between job satisfaction and life satisfaction (Rode, 2004). Rice et al. (1980) in their article ‘The job-satisfaction/life-satisfaction relationship: a review of empirical research’, reviewed empirical research related to the impact of satisfaction with work on SWL. In this article they surveyed 23 different studies covering 350 job-SWL satisfaction relationships. In 90% of the studies it was shown that the direction of relationship between job-satisfaction and life-satisfaction was positive and the few negative relationships encountered were not statistically significant.
In their research to find out relationship between SWL and aspects of social role participation on patients suffering from ankylosing spondylitis, Van Genderen et al.
(2017) documented that more physical comfort, and satisfaction with interpersonal relations and leisure were indicated by higher SWL. A study on substance use disorder reported that patients showed positive improvement in their SWL following abstinence for one year (Hagen et al., 2017). Burger and Samuel (2017) reported that life satisfaction among young adolescents was predicated upon their baseline stress levels and ability to cope and fluctuations in their stress and self-efficacy levels, as they transition into young adulthood.
Hawi and Samaha (2017) documented that self-esteem has a positive relation with SWL where as, there is a negative relationship between self-esteem and addictive use of social media. Positive emotions, self-esteem, and interpersonal relationships together contribute 50% of the variance of life satisfaction. Greater happiness, better mood and higher level of life satisfaction is reported by people when they are in the company of others who are happy, satisfied and feel positive (Fowler and Christakis, 2008; Hill et al., 2010). Kaučič et al. (2017) conducted a study on senior citizens and found that while the index of self-esteem and self-image determined life satisfaction scores; spirituality was strongly associated with determining life satisfaction and in fact had the highest average value of R2 = 0.37. This study concluded that the spiritual factor is an important ingredient of SWL in old age.
3.2 Vipassana meditation
VM is a way of transforming oneself through self-observation. This self-observation paves the way to increase in awareness and mental peace resulting in equanimity (Goenka, 1991). Vipassana technique can be used to facilitate self-awareness in the
individual which enhances a sense of mind and body balance. The increased self- awareness helps one to get out of automated non-adaptive reactive behaviour and inculcates appropriate adaptive responses due to which the individual is able to manage and handle stressful life situations successfully (Hart, 1987). Kabat-Zinn (1982) validated this by reporting that mindfulness allows the mind to look beyond old autopilot-based models of reacting to life experiences and helps discover new ways of responding to these life experiences and situations.
The person practicing Vipassana or insight meditation tends to develop the ability to differentiate between his perceived and actual thoughts as well as experiences (Williams et al., 2007). Brown et al. (2007) stated that the world is viewed by us according to our perception of it and we do not consider the factual reality. By practicing mindfulness meditation, the person is able to evaluate and look at the experience of mental suffering and anguish, in a balanced and true light, for what it is. According to Wallace and Shapiro (2006), after doing mindfulness meditation the realisation dawns on the person that the experience of mental distress is due to the disparity between real and imagined experiences, perceived by the individual.
Vipassana means insight, ‘to see things as they really are’. It is to see the things again and again in a special way. Vipassana was rediscovered by Buddha more than 2,500 years ago.
It comprises of three parts:
1 Anapana 2 VM
3 Metta Bhavana.
‘Anapana’ is to observe one’s natural incoming and outgoing breath as it is without influencing it in any way, much like an observer and Metta Bhavana is wishing for the well-being of all beings.
Vipassana is to observe objectively the sensations inside the body again and again, in an iterative manner. The self-observation leads to the development of an ability in the practitioner to get out of compulsive thought patterns by quietening the mind. The quietening of the mind makes it more conscious and aware of the present moment in terms of what is happening in the here and now, and helps to purify it. This purification of mind enables the individual to respond in a healthier manner based on reality, independent of subconscious thoughts by coming out of repetitive and unwanted mental conversations. Vipassana “increases self-awareness, promotes integration of subjective experience, and facilitates acceptance and tolerance to sufficiently reduce physical and psychological distress” (Fleischman, 1999). The individual’s behaviour and personality begins to undergo remarkable transformational change. Fleischman (1991) remarks that mindfulness awakens in the individual, a sense of well-being that motivates a person to further improve his personal and real self.
As individuals practice VM they experience a sense of well-being motivating them to invest further in improving their own selves in an enthusiastic manner. Individuals realise that by practicing VM they improve themselves as human beings regardless of their religious beliefs, their position in society, their degree of wealth or power (Goenka, 1991).
3.3 Applications of VM
Khurana and Dhar (2002) reported that mild to moderately severe neurotic cases of anxiety, depression, and adjustment problems have shown complete recovery as a result of Vipassana. The clinical utility of Vipassana is considered to be more in providing a general psychological pattern of positive mental states rather than as a response to any particular presenting problem, which makes it a perfect anti-stress remedy and an excellent human potential development method (Chokhani, 1995). Nathawat et al. (1997) have also reported the efficacy of Vipassana in managing anxiety, stress-related symptoms and other emotional problems. Also, the clinical study in healthy subjects by Chiesa (2010) suggested that VM could enhance more mature defences and coping styles.
In a study conducted by Chambers et al. (2008) it was found that there was a significant improvement in working memory performance and sustained attention in participants after undergoing an intensive 10-day mindfulness meditation retreat when compared with individuals who had not gone through the meditation retreat. The health and wellness benefits in terms of psychological relief and reduction in anxiety are observed in employees practicing mindfulness. This may be due to decreased stress levels experienced by employees after the mindfulness practice (Nila et al., 2016; Hülsheger et al., 2013). Mindfulness meditation tends to foster self-regulation of stress (Kadziolka, 2016). Brown and Ryan (2003) reported that mindfulness helps to reduce hostility, depression, self-consciousness and enhances life satisfaction and PA.
Kumar (2012) documented that VM and mindfulness significantly influenced professional and personal effectiveness of managers. It was effective in reducing stress as well and helped to increase productivity of the employees (Bhatnagar, 2014). In his study, Banerjee (2012) found that employees who meditate daily were more focussed, composed and attentive in their work. Avey et al. (2008) have documented that mindful employees have greater opportunity to become aware of thinking patterns that challenge their ability to be hopeful, efficacious, optimistic, and resilient at work, especially during times of organisational change. Gopalakrishna (2006) in his empirical study has shown that irrespective of demographic variables such as gender, age, education and position, respondents who underwent VM courses had developed professional, interpersonal and personal effectiveness, and enjoyed mental peace.
Parihar (2004) documented the impact of Vipassana on government officials.
Vipassana helped them to reduce negative feelings in their personal and professional lives. This study was instrumental in prompting the Government of Maharashtra into introducing VM in government offices. Agrawal and Bedi (2002) in their study on Delhi Police trainees reported positive improvement in the interpersonal relationships of the participants after undergoing VM. The beneficial effects of VM suggests its adoption by organisations to foster efficient functioning (Ariyabuddhiphongs and Pratchawittayagorn, 2014).
Literature is replete with examples of research studies that have found that mindfulness meditation consistently improves mood and affect. Some of these studies are highlighted below:
1 Davidson et al. (2003) reported increased happiness and positive mood among employees working in a high stress work environment who had undergone a mindfulness meditation program (Galantino et al., 2005).
2 Orzech et al. (2009) measured the SWB in participants who underwent a month long, mindfulness training program, and found significant enhancement in well-being and SWB.
3 SWB can be predicted by mindfulness facets (Harrington et al., 2016).
4 McCraty et al. (2003) reported that even with a short term mindfulness intervention, participants said that they perceived improved emotional health and enhanced positive outlook on life.
The vast majority of mindfulness benefits reported are psychological and affective in nature. Research has reported inverse relationships between mindfulness and perceived stress (Black et al., 2012; Bränström et al., 2010). Support for mindfulness interventions has been found in studies addressing stress and generalised anxiety (Kabat-Zinn, 1990;
Kabat-Zinn et al., 1992), depressive relapse (Teasdale et al., 2000), and addictive behaviours (Marlatt et al., 2004). Shiera and Graham (2011) concluded that being mindful affected respondents’ overall SWB. Mindfulness tends to moderate the relationship between SWL and age and can be a proactive tool for health and SWB (Allen et al., 2017).
Goleman (1995) has stated that trait EI is an important factor in managerial performance as it is indicative of success in life. According to Chu (2010) there is a direct relationship between mindfulness practice and increase in EI. Palmer et al. (2002) have reported that EI is related to SWB and SWL.
Pradhan et al. (2016) in their comparative study of mindfulness and SWL on meditator and non-meditator groups comprising of 155 respondents each, reported that higher levels of mindfulness were associated with higher scores of life satisfaction.
Satisfaction with one’s life and perceiving life to be meaningful are indicators of spiritual well-being (Moberg, 1986). In another study, a higher level of job satisfaction was shown by the workers practicing mindfulness meditation which included loving kindness meditation as a part of it (Hülsheger et al., 2013). The study by Bloch et al. (2017) reconfirmed the connection and relationship between meditation, mindfulness, and meaning in life.
Literature review indicated that VM affects SWB, happiness, and its benefits are psychological and affective. Considering this, the present empirical study is conducted on non-meditator and Vipassana meditator employees to understand and study the relationship between SWL and VM and make a contribution towards existing research literature. The scale used in this research was satisfaction with life scale (SWLS).
3.4 Validation of SWLS
The suitability and credentials of the SWLS developed by Diener et al. (1985), has been validated in many ways in previous studies.
1 Convergent validity of the SWLS was assessed by comparing it with other related scales. For instance the self-report SWLS was verified with peer reports by a number of researchers (Lucas et al., 1996; Pavot and Diener, 1993). Also it was determined that there was relatively high degree of correlation between the conclusions of the SWLS and a person’s actual satisfaction with a sample day, a memory recall task of satisfying and dissatisfying times of that day (Lyubomirsky et al., 2005).
2 Secondly, temporal stability of the scale was verified by administering the instrument twice and having a time interval between the two measurements. It was found that such repeated measurements remained stable in spite of the time interval between them (Lucas et al., 1996; Pavot and Diener, 1993). But as the time interval was made larger the correlations between the measurements reduced (Lucas and Donnellan, 2007).
3 Thirdly, discriminant validity of the SWLS was shown by separating the SWLS from other constructs, such as PA (Lucas et al., 1996; Pavot and Diener, 1993).
Also Pavot and Diener (1993) demonstrated that the SWLS was unaffected by current mood, showing that it measures quiescent state of global assessment of life satisfaction rather than recent dynamic processes.
3.5 The SWLS
SWLS was developed by Diener et al. (1985) to measure an individual’s satisfaction of his own life taken as a whole or global life satisfaction. However, satisfaction or happiness synonymous with different domains of life, as well as positive and NA are not included in it as these are more of emotional measures and not cognitive functions (Diener et al., 1999).
SWLS is a self-report instrument consisting of five items, related to global life satisfaction, in contrast to other global life satisfaction measures that typically have only a single item (Kahneman and Krueger, 2006). It is designed to measure individual’s assessment of his SWL in general. For example one of the statements can be given as ‘the conditions of my life are excellent’. It comprises of a 7-point Likert scale varying from
‘strongly agree’ to ‘strongly disagree’. Sum total of the responses gives the overall score of SWL. Research on SWLS has demonstrated acceptable psychometric properties (Radhakrishnan and Chan, 1997).
4 Methodology
The data was collected from employees of various organisations who enrolled at Bangalore Vipassana Meditation Centre, South India, for a 10-day residential Vipassana course. The sampling technique used for collecting the data was judgmental sampling.
The selection criteria ensured that the subjects were regular practitioners of VM and had adopted it as a way of life. The instrument had a section to capture demographics and information regarding meditation practice. It was administered for data collection to the following two groups of employees, namely,
1 Non-meditators (control group) – Employees coming to a VM course for the first time.
2 Meditators (experimental group) – Employees who are practitioners of VM and have already completed at least three 10-day Vipassana courses.
Employees attending the course came from different cross-sections of society. SWLS was administered to meditators and non-meditators coming for a 10-day VM course in Bangalore (Pradhan et al., 2016). Participation in the study was voluntary. In the
questionnaire, no personal details were requested and there was an explicit declaration that the data collected would be used only for research purposes. The questionnaire had clear instructions regarding filling it up. Participants had sufficient time (4–5 hours) to complete the questionnaire. Completed questionnaires were collected prior to the start of the course.
For final analysis a total of 240 samples each were collected from non-meditator and meditator groups after filtering out incomplete responses.
Both the groups were matched on the demographic factors as shown in Table 1.
Table 1 Demographic composition of the two groups
Demographic factor Non-meditator group Meditator group
Age Mean = 38.28 years Mean = 39.31
Gender Male % = 57.5% Male % = 57.1%
Marital status Married % = 63.3% Married % = 56.3%
Educational level Graduates and above % = 90% Graduates and above % = 91.3%
Dominant work-sector Services and software % =57.1% Services and software % = 61.7%
Work position held Middle and senior % = 53.8% Middle and senior % = 54.9%
The chi-square test conducted for the demographic factors between the two groups indicated that all the tests were insignificant as p > 0.05 for all demographic factors.
Therefore the two groups were demographically similar.
5 SWLS data analysis
5.1 SWLS scores descriptive and t-test analysis
The exploratory factor analysis extracted a single factor which is in agreement with single factor structure of the standardised SWLS (Diener et al., 1985).
The values for Cronbach alpha = 0.733 and Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin measure (KMO) = 0.783 were found to be in acceptable range indicating factor reliability and sampling adequacy. The group statistics are shown in Table 2.
Table 2 Independent samples group statistics
Independent samples group statistics – SWLS
FACTORS N Mean scores Std. deviation Std. error mean
TOTAL_SWLS Non-meditators 240 21.5958 6.503 0.420
Meditators 240 25.2875 5.015 0.324
The group statistics show the mean scores of SWLS obtained by the non-meditator group and the meditator group. The meditator group scored higher than the non-meditator group.
The distribution of scores obtained for the SWLS factor for both non-meditator and meditator groups are shown in Figure 1.
The t-test mean difference values and the significance values are reported in Table 3.
The t-test conducted for both the groups validated our earlier findings indicating higher life satisfaction scores in case of meditator group as t is negative with p < 0.05, (Pradhan et al., 2016). This result shows that practice of VM makes a statistically significant difference to the SWL scores obtained by meditators versus non-meditators.
Figure 1 SWLS scores of non-meditators and meditators (see online version for colours) SWLS score distribution
Table 3 Independent samples t-test
Independent samples t-test – SWLS scores T – test for equality of means
t df Sig. (2-tailed) Mean difference Std. error difference
Total SWLS –6.964 478 0.001 –3.692 0.530
5.2 ANOVA analysis of scores
The data was further analysed to understand the univariate interactions between the dependent SWLS score and the independent demographic and meditation variables for the meditator group.
5.3 Effect of demographic variables on SWLS score
The SWLS scores obtained by meditators were analysed using ANOVA to determine whether demographic factors such as age or educational qualifications had any significant influence on the SWLS scores of meditators. The results of the analysis are as indicated in Table 4. For all the demographic factors the null hypotheses are accepted (p > 0.05) and therefore the demographic factors have no effect on SWLS scores. This is in line with previous research (Arrindell et al., 1991).
Table 4 Univariate analysis of SWLS scores and demographic factors ANOVA univariate analysis: SWLS scores and demographic factors Demographic variable Result of between subject effects Conclusion Age category F(4,235) = 1.06, p = 0.379, squared
eta = 0.018, power = 0.331 Since p > 0.05, age has no effect
Gender F(1,238) = 0.000, p = 0.987, squared
eta = 0.000, power = 0.050 Since p > 0.05, gender has no effect
Marital status F(2,237) = 1.01, p = 0.368, squared
eta = 0.008, power = 0.224 Since p > 0.05, marital status has no effect Educational
qualifications F(2,237) = 0.221, p = 0.802, squared
eta = 0.002, power = 0.084 Since p > 0.05, educational qualifications have no effect Work sector F(5,234) = 1.20, p = 0.314, squared
eta = 0.025, power = 0.420 Since p > 0.05, work sector has no effect Position held F(2,237) = 0.162, p = 0.851, squared
eta = 0.001, power = 0.075 Since p > 0.05, position held has no effect
5.4 Effect of meditation variables on SWLS scores
For the meditator group, data was collected on meditation practice done by respondents and meditation practice was characterised by three meditation variables namely,
a Course category (CC) – Measures the number of courses attended by the meditator.
b Daily practice hours (DPH) – Measures the amount of time devoted to meditation practice every day by the meditator.
c Years of Vipassana practice (YVP) – Measure the degree to which the meditator has adopted meditation as a way of life.
ANOVA analysis was conducted between these meditation variables and the scores of SWLS.
There was no significant main effect of CC and DPH on SWLS scores as p > 0.05.
1 There was a significant main effect of YVP on total SWLS score:
F(2, 213) = 5.40, p = 0.005, eta squared = 0.048, power = 0.841.
2 There was a significant interaction between CC * YVP on total SWLS score:
F(4,213) = 7.76, p = 0.001, eta squared = 0.127, power = 0.997.
3 There was a significant interaction between DPH * YVP on SWLS score:
F(4,213) = 4.03, p = 0.004, eta squared = 0.070, power = 0.907.
Clearly, YVP has a significant effect on total SWLS scores and it also interacts with the other two meditation variables, namely DPHs and CC to determine total SWLS scores.
6 Discussion
1 SWLS scores of the employees practising VM were higher when compared with non-meditator employees.
2 t-test results showed that meditator employees had statistically significant higher SWLS scores indicating that employees practicing VM were more satisfied with life.
It could be concluded that this may lead to better SWB, happiness, and quality of life as they are conceptually related (Diener et al., 1999; Sergin and Taylor, 2007).
Higher scores of SWLS also indicated meaningful life and spiritual well-being (Moberg, 1986).
3 As validated in literature demographic factors such as age, gender, marital status, education, work sector and work position did not have any effect on SWLS scores (Arrindell et al., 1991).
4 SWLS scores remained unaffected by meditation variables like number of courses, daily practice hours. Number of years of meditation practice had a significant effect on SWLS. Also years of VM meditation practice interacted significantly with both the meditation variables namely number of courses and daily practice hours indicating that taken together with years of regular practice, number of courses undertaken and daily practice are able to impact SWLS scores. Therefore just doing courses repetitively is not effective. It is the regularity of the practice over number of years that is most important and it will give the practitioner the innumerable benefits of this meditation technique irrespective of the cast, creed, age, gender, education, work area and position of the individual.
7 Limitations
1 ‘Before’ and ‘after’ research design could not be implemented due to time constraints and lack of resources as well as availability of meditators.
2 It is possible that a self-report questionnaire may not always accurately measure a cognitive quantity like SWL.
8 Future research
1 The study can be conducted with ‘before’ and ‘after’ design with a longer time frame.
2 A detailed study of long term meditators in terms of frequency and duration of meditation practice, its application and effectiveness in daily situations could be undertaken to understand the effects of long term meditation in day to day life.
9 Conclusions
VM when used as an intervention showed higher scores on employees’ SWL. This is in agreement with earlier research findings (Davidson et al., 2003). The results showed that it is not just a theoretical concept and practice is of paramount importance.
The literature review indicated that the direction of relationship between job-satisfaction and life-satisfaction is positive implying that employees with higher values on SWLS show better satisfaction with their jobs. As SWB, happiness, quality of life and SWLS are related concepts this may help employees to lead a meaningful life.
VM is indeed an excellent intervention in an organisational scenario. At a practical level it is suggested that employers encourage their employees to take up VM. It will help them to be more spiritual, peaceful, and satisfied with their life. This in turn may foster better performance from employees which will be conducive for organisational growth and efficient functioning.
References
Agrawal, R. and Bedi, K. (2002) ‘Transforming the self: exploring effects of Vipassana on Delhi police trainees’, Journal of Human Values, Vol. 8, No. 1, pp.45–56.
Allen, T.D., Henderson, T.G., Mancini, V.S. et al. (2017) ‘Mindfulness and meditation practice as moderators of the relationship between age and subjective wellbeing among working adults’, Mindfulness, Vol. 8, p.1055 [online] https://doi.org/10.1007/s12671-017-0681-6.
Allen, T.D., Herst, D.E.L., Bruck, C.S. and Sutton, M. (2000) ‘Consequences associated with work-to-family conflict: a review and agenda for future research’, Journal of Occupational and Health Psychology, Vol. 5, No. 2, pp.278–308.
Andrews, F.M. and Withey, S.B. (1976) Social Indicators of Well-Being America’s Perception of Life Quality, Plenum Press, New York.
Argyle, M., Martin, M. and Crossland, J. (1989) ‘Happiness as a function of personality and social encounters’, in Forgas, J.P. and Innes, M. (Eds.): Recent Advances in Social Psychology: An International Perspective, Elsevier Science Publishers B.V., Amsterdam, North-Holland.
Ariyabuddhiphongs, V. and Pratchawittayagorn, A. (2014) ‘Peace of mind and organizational citizenship behavior: the mediating effect of loving kindness’, Archive for the Psychology of Religion, Vol. 36, No. 2, pp.233–252, DOI: 10.1163/15736121-12341284; ISSN: 0084-6724 E-ISSN: 1573-6121.
Arrindell, W.A., Meeuwesen, L. and Huyse, F.J. (1991) ‘The satisfaction with life scale (SWLS):
psychometric properties in a non-psychiatric medical outpatients sample’, Personality and Individual Differences, Vol. 12, No. 2, pp.117–123.
Arthaud-Day, M.L., Rode, J.C., Mooney, C.H. and Near, J.P. (2005) ‘The subjective well-being construct: a test of its convergent, discriminant, and factorial validity’, Social Indicators Research, Vol. 74, No. 3, pp.445–476.
Avey, J.B., Wernsing, T.S. and Luthas, F. (2008) ‘Can positive employees help positive organization change?’, Journal of Applied Behavioural Science, Vol. 44, No. 1, pp.48–70.
Banerjee, S. (2012) ‘A key to alleviate business related challenges: crunching meditation science and its influence on brain & physiology’, International Journal of Management, Vol. 3, No. 2, pp.348–369.
Beutell, N. (2006) ‘Life satisfaction, a sloan network encyclopaedia entry’, Journal of Sloan Work and Family, Vol. 2, No. 3, pp.1125–1127 [online] http://wfnetwork.bc.edu/
encyclopaediaentry.php?id=3283&area=academics (accessed 11 February 2018).
Bhargava, S. (1995) ‘An integration-theoretical analysis of life satisfaction’, Psychological Studies, Vol. 40, No. 2, pp.170–174.
Bhatnagar, V. (2014) ‘Stress management – a way to increase efficiency and effectiveness of employees: a study of Vipassana meditation’, International Journal of Application or Innovation in Engineering and Management, Vol. 3, No. 1, pp.498–504.
Biswas-Diener, R. and Diener, E. (2001) ‘Making the best of a bad situation: satisfaction in the slums of Calcutta’, Social Indicators Research, Vol. 55, No. 3, pp.329–352.
Black, D.S., Sussman, S., Johnson, C.A. and Milam, J. (2012) ‘Psychometric assessment of the mindful attention awareness scale (MAAS) among Chinese adolescents’, Assessment, Vol. 19, No. 1, pp.42–52.
Bloch, J.H., Farrell, J.E., Hook, J.N., Van Tongeren, D.R., Penberthy, J.K. and Davis, D.E. (2017)
‘The effectiveness of a meditation course on mindfulness and meaning in life’, Spirituality in Clinical Practice, Vol. 4, No. 2, pp.100–112.
Bränström, S., Kvillemo, P., Brandberg, Y. and Moskawitz, J.T. (2010) ‘Self-report mindfulness as a mediator of psychological well-being in a stress reduction intervention for cancer patients: a randomized study’, Annals of Behavioural Medicine, Vol. 39, No. 2, pp.151–161.
Brewer, J.A., Worhunsky, P.D., Gray, J.R., Tang, Y.Y., Weber, J. and Kober, H. (2011)
‘Meditation experience is associated with differences in default mode network activity and connectivity’, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. 108, No. 50, pp.20254–20259.
Brown, K.W. and Ryan, K.M. (2003) ‘The benefits of being present: mindfulness and its role in psychological well-being’, Journal of Personality & Social Psychology, Vol. 84, No. 4, pp.822–848.
Brown, K.W., Ryan, R.M. and Creswell, J.D. (2007) ‘Mindfulness: theoretical foundations and evidence for its salutary effects’, Psychological Inquiry, Vol. 18, No. 4, pp.211–237.
Burger, K. and Samuel, R. (2017) ‘The role of perceived stress and self-efficacy in young people’s life satisfaction: a longitudinal study’, Journal of Youth and Adolescence, Vol. 46, No. 1, pp.78–90 [online] https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-016-0608-x.
Campbell, A., Converse, P.E. and Rogers, W.L. (1976) The Quality of American Life, New York, in Diener, E. (1984) ‘Subjective well-being’, Psychological Bulletin, Vol. 95, No. 3, pp.542–575.
Chambers, R., Lo, B.C.Y. and Allen, N.B. (2008) ‘The impact of intensive mindfulness training on attentional control, cognitive style, and affect’, Cognitive Therapy and Research, Vol. 32, No. 3, pp.303–322.
Chamorro-Premuzic, T., Bennett, E. and Furnham, A. (2007) ‘The happy personality: mediational role of trait emotional intelligence’, Personality and Individual Differences, Vol. 42, No. 8, pp.1633–1639.
Chiesa, A. (2010) ‘Vipassana meditation: systematic review of current evidence’, Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, Vol. 16, No. 1, pp.37–46.
Chokhani, R.M. (1995) ‘Vipassana meditation and positive mental health’, Bombay Psychologist, Vol. 12, Nos. 1/2, pp.43–47.
Chu, L.C. (2010) ‘The benefits of meditation vis-à-vis emotional intelligence, perceived stress and negative mental health’, Stress and Health, Vol. 26, No. 2, pp.169–180.
Church, A.T., Katigbak, M.S., Locke, K.D., Zhang, H., Shen, J., de Jesús Vargas-Flores, J. and Mastor, K.A. (2013) ‘Need satisfaction and well-being testing self-determination theory in eight cultures’, Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, Vol. 44, No. 4, pp.507–534.
Coates, B. (2009) ‘The Arya (i) leader: a Vrio (ii) for competitive advantage’, Business Renaissance Quarterly, Vol. 4, No. 3, pp.39–59.
Davidson, R.J., Kabat-Zinn, J., Schumacher, J., Rosencranz, M., Muller, D., Santorelli, S.F. et al.
(2003) ‘Alterations in brain and immune function produced by mindfulness meditation’, Psychosomatic Medicine, Vol. 65, No. 4, pp.564–570.
Diener, E. (2000) ‘Subjective well-being: the science of happiness and a proposal for a national index’, American Psychologist, Vol. 55, No. 1, pp.34–43.
Diener, E., Emmons, R.A., Larsen, R.J. and Griffin, S. (1985) ‘The satisfaction with life scale’, Journal of Personality Assessment, Vol. 49, No. 1, pp.71–75.
Diener, E., Magnus, K. and Fujita, F. (1991) A Longitudinal Examination of Life Events and Subjective Well-Being, Unpublished manuscript, University of Illinois.
Diener, E., Oishi, S. and Lucas, R.E. (2015) ‘National accounts of subjective well-being’, American Psychologist, Vol. 70, No. 1, pp.234–242.
Diener, E., Suh, E. and Oishi, S. (1997) ‘Recent findings on subjective well-being’, Indian Journal of Clinical Psychology, Vol. 24, No. 1, pp.25–41.
Diener, E., Suh, E.M., Lucas, R.E. and Smith, H.L. (1999) ‘Subjective well-being: three decades of progress’, Psychological Bulletin, Vol. 125, No. 2, pp.276–302.
Evans, M.D.R. and Kelley, J. (2004) ‘Effect of family structure on life satisfaction: Australian evidence?’, Social Indicators Research, Vol. 69, No. 3, pp.303–349.
Ferguson, P.C. (1981) An Integrative Meta-Analysis of Psychological Studies Investigating The Treatment Outcomes of Meditation Studies, Doctoral dissertation, University of Colorado, Dissertation Abstracts International, Vol. 41, No. 4-A, p.1547.
Fleischman, P.R. (1991) Vipassana Meditation: Healing The Healer: The Experience of Impermanence, Vipassana Research Institute, Igatpuri, India.
Fleischman, P.R. (1999) Vipassana: A Unique Contribution to Mental Health, Vipassana Research Publications, Seattle, Washington.
Fowler, J.H. and Christakis, N.A. (2008) ‘Dynamic spread of happiness in a large social network:
longitudinal analysis over 20 years in the Framingham heart study’, British Medical Journal, Vol. 337, pp.1–9, DOI: 10.1136/bmj.a2338.
Galantino, M., Baime, M., Maguire, M., Szapary, P.O. and Farrar, J.T. (2005) ‘Association of psychological and physiological measures of stress in health-care professionals during an 8-week mindfulness meditation program: mindfulness in practice’, Stress & Health: Journal of the International Society for the Investigation of Stress, Vol. 21, No. 4, pp.255–261.
Goenka, S.N. (1991) The Art of Living: Vipassana Meditation, Vipassana Research Institute, Igatpuri, India.
Goleman, D. (1995) Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ, Bloomsbury, Bloomsbury Publishing, London.
Gopalakrishna, D. (2006) Buddhism and Contemporary Management, Buddhist Cultural Centre, Kandy Sri Lanka.
Hagen, E., Erga, A.H., Hagen, K.P., Nesvåg, S.M., McKay, J.R., Lundervold, A.J. and Walderhaug, E. (2017) ‘One-year sobriety improves satisfaction with life, executive functions and psychological distress among patients with polysubstance use disorder’, Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment, Vol. 76, pp.81–87, [online] https://doi.org/10.1016/
j.jsat.2017.01.016.
Harrington, R., Loffredo, D.A. and Perz, C.A. (2016) ‘Dispositional mindfulness facets and self-insight as predictors of subjective well-being: an exploratory analysis’, North American Journal of Psychology, Winter Garden, Vol. 18, No. 3, pp.469–482.
Hart, W. (1987) The Art of Living: Vipassana Meditation, Taught by S.N. Goenka, Harper & Row, New York.
Hawi, N.S. and Samaha, M. (2017) ‘The relations among social media addiction, self-esteem, and life satisfaction in university students’, Social Science Computer Review, Vol. 35, No. 5, pp.576–586.
Hill, A.L., Rand, D.G., Nowak, M.A. and Christakis, N.A. (2010) ‘Infectious disease modeling of social contagion in networks’, PLoS Computational Biology, Vol. 6, No. 11, p.e1000968.
Hülsheger, U.R., Alberts, H.J.E.M., Feinholdt, A. and Lang, J.W.B. (2013) ‘Benefits of mindfulness at work: the role of mindfulness in emotion regulation, emotional exhaustion, and job satisfaction’, Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol. 98, No. 2, pp.310–325.
Kabat-Zinn, J. (1982) ‘An out-patient program in behavioral medicine for chronic pain patients based on mindfulness meditation: theoretical considerations and preliminary results’, General Hospital Psychiatry, Vol. 4, No. 1, pp.33–42.
Kabat-Zinn, J. (1990) Full Catastrophe Living: Using the Wisdom of Your Body and Mind to Face Stress, Pain, and Illness, Delacorte, New York.
Kabat-Zinn, J., Massion, A.O., Kristeller, J., Peterson, L.G., Fletcher, K.E., Pbert, L. et al. (1992)
‘Effectiveness of a meditation-based stress reduction program in the treatment of anxiety disorders’, American Journal of Psychiatry, Vol. 149, No. 7, pp.936–943.
Kadziolka, M.J., Di Pierdomenico, E.A. and Miller, C.J. (2016) ‘Trait-like mindfulness promotes healthy self-regulation of stress’, Mindfulness, Vol. 7, No. 1, pp.236–245 [online]
https://doi.org /10.1007/s12671-015-0437-0.
Kahneman, D. and Krueger, A.B. (2006) ‘Developments in the measurement of subjective well-being’, Journal of Economic Perspectives, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp.3–24.
Kaučič, B.M., Filej, B., Perović, B.T. and Ovsenik, M. (2017) ‘Spiritual factor as an important element of life satisfaction in old age’, Informatologia, Vol. 50, Nos. 3–4, pp.170–182.
Khurana, A. and Dhar, P.L. (2002) Effect of Vipassana Meditation on Quality of Life, Subjective Well-Being and Criminal Propensity Among Inmates of Tihar Jail, Indian Institute of Technology, Vipassana Research Institute (VRI), Delhi, New Delhi.
Kumar, D.M. (2012) ‘Vipassana meditation and life effectiveness’, Journal of Education &
Vocational Research, Vol. 3, No. 2, pp.48–57.
Lavalekar, A. (2007) ‘Gender-wise comparison on emotional intelligence and marital satisfaction’, Gender and Behaviour, Vol. 5, No. 2, pp.1388–1405.
Lucas, R.E. and Donnellan, M.B. (2007) ‘How stable is happiness? Using the STARTS model to estimate the reliability of life satisfaction’, Journal of Research in Personality, Vol. 41, No. 5, pp.1091–1098.
Lucas, R.E., Diener, E. and Suh, E. (1996) ‘Discriminant validity of well-being measures’, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 71, No. 3, pp.616–628.
Lyubomirsky, S., King, L. and Diener, E. (2005) ‘The benefits of frequent positive affect: does happiness lead to success?’, Psychological Bulletin, Vol. 131, No. 6, pp.803–855.
Marlatt, G.A., Witkiewitz, K., Dillworth, T.M., Bowen, S., Parks, G.A., MacPherson, L.M. et al.
(2004) ‘Vipassana meditation as a treatment for alcohol and drug use disorders’, in Hayes, S.C., Linehan, M.M. and Follette, V.M. (Eds.): Mindfulness And Acceptance:
Expanding The Cognitive-Behavioural Tradition, pp.261–287, The Guilford Press, New York.
Marques, J. and Dhiman, S. (2009) ‘Vipassana meditation as a path toward improved management practices’, Journal of Global Business Issues, Vol. 3, No. 2, pp.77–84.
McCrae, R.R. and Costa, J.P.T. (1987) ‘Validation of the five-factor model of personality across instruments and observers’, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 52, No. 1, pp.81–90.
McCraty, R., Atkinson, M. and Tomasino, D. (2003) ‘Impact of a workplace stress reduction program on blood pressure and emotional health in hypertensive employees’, The Journal of Alternative & Complementary Medicine, Vol. 9, No. 3, pp.355–369.
Mehrotra, S. and Tripathi, T. (2011) ‘Positive psychology research in India: a review and critique’, Journal of the Indian Academy of Applied Psychology, Vol. 37, No. 1, pp.9–26.
Moberg, D.O. (1986) ‘Spirituality and science, the progress, problems, and promise of scientific research on spiritual wellbeing’, Journal of the American Scientific Affiliation, Vol. 38, No. 3, pp.186–194.
Nalawade, R.C. and Pradhan, S. (2016) ‘Stress relieving techniques for organizational stressors’, International Journal of Research in Commerce & Management, Vol. 7, No. 3, pp.93–98, ISSN: 0976-2183.
Nathawat, S.S., Gehlot, S. and Sharda, P. (1997) ‘Role of Vipassana meditation in emotional problems’, Indian Journal of Psychiatry, Vol. 39, No. 2, p.26.
Nila, K., Holt, D.V., Ditzen, B. and Aguilar-Raab, C. (2016) ‘Mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) enhances distress tolerance and resilience through changes in mindfulness’, Mental Health & Prevention, Vol. 4, No. 1, pp.36–41.
Orzech, K.M., Shapiro, S.L., Brown, K.W. and McKay, M. (2009) ‘Intensive mindfulness training-related changes in cognitive and emotional experience’, The Journal of Positive Psychology, Vol. 4, No. 3, pp.212–222.
Palmer, B., Donaldson, C. and Stough, C. (2002) ‘Emotional intelligence and life satisfaction’, Personality and Individual Differences, Vol. 33, No. 7, pp.1091–1100.
Parihar, D. (2004) Vipassana in Government, Vipassana Research Institute, Igatpuri, India.
Pavot, W.G. and Diener, E. (1993) ‘Review of the satisfaction with life scale’, Psychological Assessment, Vol. 5, No. 2, pp.164–172.
Peterson, C., Park, N. and Seligman, M.E.P. (2005) ‘Orientations to happiness and life satisfaction:
the full life versus the empty life’, Journal of Happiness Studies, Vol. 6, No. 1, pp.25–41.
Pradhan, S., Ajithkumar, V.V. and Singh, M. (2016) ‘Effect of Vipassana meditation on mindfulness and life satisfaction of employees’, International Journal of Research in Commerce & Management, Vol. 7, No. 3, pp.11–16, ISSN: 0976-2183.
Radhakrishnan, P. and Chan, D.K-S. (1997) ‘Cultural differences in the relation between self-discrepancy and life satisfaction’, International Journal of Psychology, Vol. 32, No. 6, pp.387–398.
Rice, R.W., Near, J.P. and Hunt, R.G. (1980) ‘The job-satisfaction/life-satisfaction relationship: a review of empirical research’, Basic and Applied Social Psychology, Vol. 1, No. 1, pp.37–64.
Robert, T., Young, J.S. and Kelly, V.A. (2006) ‘Relationships between adult workers’ spiritual well- being and job satisfaction: a preliminary study’, Counseling and Values, Vol. 50, No. 3, pp.165–175, DOI: 10.1002/j.2161-007X.2006.tb00053.x.
Rode, J.C. (2004) ‘Job satisfaction and life satisfaction revisited: a longitudinal test of an integrated model’, Human Relations, Vol. 57, pp.1205–1230, DOI: 10.1177/0018726704047143.
Rothschild, S., Kaplan, G., Golan, T. and Barak, Y. (2017) ‘Mindfulness meditation in the Israel Defense Forces: effect on cognition and satisfaction with life – a randomized controlled trial’, European Journal of Integrative Medicine, Vol. 10, No. 1, pp.71–74.
Sandhu, D.S. (2007) ‘Seven stages of spiritual development: a framework to solve psycho-spiritual problems’, in Morgan, O.J. (Ed.): Counselling and Spirituality, pp.64–92, Lahaska/Houghton Mifflin, Boston.
Schimmack, U. and Oishi, S. (2005) ‘The influence of chronically and temporarily accessible information on life satisfaction judgments’, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 89, No. 3, pp.395–406.
Sergin, C. and Taylor, P. (2007) ‘Positive interpersonal relationships mediate the association between social skills and psychological well-being’, Journal of Personality and Individual Differences, Vol. 43, No. 4, pp.637–646.
Shiera, M.L. and Graham, J.R. (2011) ‘Mindfulness, subjective well being and social work: insight into their interconnection from social work practitioners’, Journal of International Social Work, Vol. 30, No. 1, pp.29–31.
Shin, D.C. and Johnson, D.M. (1978) ‘Avowed happiness as an overall assessment of the quality of life’, Social Indicators Research, Vol. 5, No. 1, pp.475–492, DOI: 10.1007/BF00352944.
Szczygieł, D. and Mikolajczak, M. (2017) ‘Why are people high in emotional intelligence happier?
They make the most of their positive emotions’, Personality and Individual Differences, Vol. 117, pp.177–181 [online] https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2017.05.051.
Tay, L. and Diener, E. (2011) ‘Needs and subjective well-being’, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 101, No. 2, pp.354–365.
Teasdale, J.D., Segal, Z.V, Williams, J.M.G., Ridgeway, V.A. Soulsby, J.M. and Lau, M.A. (2000)
‘Prevention of relapse/recurrence in major depression by mindfulness-based cognitive therapy’, Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, Vol. 68, No. 4, pp.615–623.
Van Beuningen, J. and Kloosterman, R. (2011) ‘Subjectief welzijn: welke factoren spleen een rol?’, Bevolkingstrends, Vol. 59, No. 4, pp.85–92.
Van Genderen, S., Plasqui, G., van der Heijde, D., van Gaalen, F., Heuft, L., Luime, J. and Boonen, A. (2017) ‘Social role participation and satisfaction with life: a study among patients with ankylosing spondylitis and population controls’, Arthritis Care & Research, DOI: 10.1002/acr.23304.
Veenhoven, R. (1991) ‘Questions on happiness: classical topics, modern answers, and blind spots’, in Stack, F., Argyle, M. and Schwartz, N. (Eds.): Subjective Well-Being: An Interdisciplinary Perspective, pp.1–26, Pergamon Press 014, Elmsford, New York.
Wallace, B.A. and Shapiro, S.L. (2006) ‘Mental balance and well-being: building bridges between Buddhism and Western psychology’, American Psychologist, Vol. 61, No. 7, pp.690–701.
Waterman, A.S. (1993) ‘Two conceptions of happiness: contrasts of personal expressiveness (eudaimonia) and hedonic enjoyment’, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 64, No. 4, pp.678–691 [online] http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.64.4.678.
Williams, J.M.G., Barnhofer, T., Crane, C., Hermans, D., Raes, F., Watkins, E. et al. (2007)
‘Autobiographical memory specificity and emotional disorder’, Psychological Bulletin, Vol. 133, No. 1, pp.122–148.
