In the academic and popular literature, the terms quality of life, happiness, life satisfaction, and prosperity are often used interchangeably to identify well-being. However, as statistical analysis of population surveys and dictionary definitions imply, these terms differ in their nuances. Addressing definitional ambiguity, we use the prior theoretical literature to provide the central concepts and tenets of well-being, articulating a definition of well-being as a composite of two underlying concepts; happiness defined as one’s momentary pleasant emotions and feelings of joy and life satisfaction defined as one’s long-term cognitive evaluation of life as a whole, a sort of deeper happiness.  Next we use the literature to group the antecedents of well-being into six livability constructs, living standard, health & environment, freedom, opportunity, community & relationships, and peace & security.  Given the six constructs, we use an empirical meta-analysis of 560 observations in 168 unique studies.  Each country or geographical area that is uniquely identified is considered an observation.  Unique studies may offer multiple constructs or antecedents that are independently assessed.  The findings indicate that increases in living standards can lead to increases in well-being.  The construct opportunity has a very limited set of measures in the prior empirical literature.  Thus, opportunity does not provide enough guidance from the prior empirical literature to establish a relationship with well-being.  This does not indicate that opportunity is not related to well-being, it only indicates that the use of meta-analysis technique is limited given the lack of prior empirical analysis. The meta-analysis results show that as freedom increases average well-being rises.  With health and environment an increase in physical, emotional and mental health are positively associated with increased well-being while limited information in the prior literature is available for the effects of environmental health on well-being.  Increases in community and family life, components of the construct community and relationships, are positively associated with well-being.  Although some of the components of peace, stability, and security have a small number of prior studies associated with them, the findings lead to a conclusion that more peace, stability, and security increases one’s well-being.

In our exploration of well-being we have been drawn to the outcome that well-being, regardless of global location, is predicated on several social constructs.  The constructs influence well-being and may also provide a set of global goals to improve well-being.  Approaching well-being from a new perspective can allow social scientists to inform policy makers about what effects well-being as we move into the new global community.