Quantifying Quality of Life: An Instrument Development Study for Personal Well-Being

Studying about an individual’s well-being is incredibly important for a multitude of reasons, impacting not only the individual themselves but also their communities and society at large. There are a number of wellbeing frameworks such as, Diener’s Subjective Well-Being (1988) comprising three core components: life satisfaction, positive affect, and low negative affect, Ryff’s (1989) model of eudaimonic well-being focuses on psychological development and self-actualization and Seligman’s PERMA model (2011), that seek to explain the intricacies of this construct in relation to how it is being practiced. This study seeks to connect the theoretical concept of well-being with how it’s measured in practice by determining a best fit model for the wellbeing questionnaire. Two hundred (200) randomly selected participants from the Arts and Sciences Program of Lourdes College, Inc. Cagayan de Oro City participated in answering the pilot test. Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) were the two statistical methods applied to meet the aims of this study. Through EFA, four (4) factors were identified namely psychological wellbeing (20 items), psychological distress (22 items), life satisfaction (12 items) and self-compassion (8 items). The reliability test conducted yielded an acceptable range value for its reliability. When CFA was administered, several items were removed which resulted in acquiring the best model fit that met the criterion indices; CMIN/DF, CFI, SRMR, RMSEA and PClose. The psychological wellbeing factor now has seven (7) items, psychological distress with seven (7) items, life satisfaction with five (5) items and self-compassion with five (5) items. Furthermore, the tool created from this study can be used to conduct future research aimed to identify groups most in need, prioritize resources, and design targeted programs.