The Impact of Cultural Values on the Association Between Family Relations and Children’s Life Satisfaction. A Comparison of Children in Two-Parent Families Across 39 Countries

Abstract

Despite increasing interest in country differences and the identification of macro-societal circumstances that shape children’s well-being, cross-national comparisons of children’s subjective well-being are still rare. This study investigates the effect of family relations on children’s life satisfaction in 39 countries from multiple world regions, with the aims of unveiling differences in average life satisfaction, comparing the effect of family relations on life satisfaction and testing the moderating effect of cultural values, emphasizing differences between collectivist and individualistic countries. Single-country regressions and multilevel modelling are used to analyse data from 129,018 children from two-parent families who participated in the first, second or third wave of the International Survey of Children’s Lives and Well-Being. The results reveal that average life satisfaction is slightly higher in individualistic societies, but that the association between the Individualism Index and life satisfaction is not linear. Good family relations are shown to improve life satisfaction in all countries, but the effect strength differs considerably. The life satisfaction of children from individualistic countries, compared to that of children from collectivist countries, suffers considerably more from the experience of bad family relations. These findings highlight the necessity of considering children’s cultural environment when examining their life satisfaction.