Measuring the social determinants of subjective well-being of working women (with special reference to Balangoda Divisional Secretariat Division)

The measurement of Subjective Well-being (SWB) has advanced rapidly over the last two decades with the several segments. Subjective well being is defined as sum of three components-life satisfaction, presence of positive affect and absence of negative affect together called “happiness”. However studies based on working women's well-being still is scarce. In this paper a attempt has made to measure the social determinants of subjective well-being for working women while identifying the variation among social determinants and subjective well-being for the selected area is the supplementary objective. Selected sample consisted with 187 married, employed women in the age group of 19–60, from 3 GN Divisions in Balangoda DS Division, through cluster sampling and convenience sampling methods, using a structured questionnaire. Weighted Principal Components Analysis (WPCA) is performed on variables for the indicators of Subjective Well-Being. Under this method, the loading from the first component of PCA are used as weights for the respective indicators. Finally the constructed social determinants of subjective well-being are classified into three categories as happy moderately happy and unhappy using cluster analysis. Indicators for community relationships, contribution of family members, social validity, organizing events and nature of the job lead to high satisfaction while working hours per week, working environment and trade union participation make less happiness among working women.