New research shows that people who live in rural and regional Australia are happier than city folk.
Released in January, the latest Australian Unity Wellbeing Index report shows that people who live in regions with a relatively small population have a greater sense of belonging and safety, which contributes significantly to their wellbeing.
Wellbeing is measured using the Personal Wellbeing Index (PWI). The PWI measures people’s overall feeling of wellbeing through satisfaction with their health, personal relationships, personal safety, standard of living, achieving in life, community connection, future security and spirituality/religion.
According to the research, areas outside the centre of major cities tend to have high wellbeing. Once the population of an area exceeds 40,000 people, wellbeing starts to fall.
Professor Bob Cummins from Deakin University, the author of the Index, said that this outcome is driven by feeling connected to the community.
“Community connection has a large impact on how people feel about their lives,” he said. “This is very difficult to achieve in larger towns and cities, but appears to be highly evident in smaller towns and country regions.”
The report combines the data from over six years of Australian Unity Wellbeing research, a total sample of approximately 35,000 people, and profiles the wellbeing of Australia according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) geographic areas, known as Statistical Sub Divisions (SSDs).
Examples of SSDs with very high levels of wellbeing are Glenelg in southwestern Victoria, Upper South East and Kangaroo Island/Yorke in southeastern South Australia, Litchfield Shire at the top of the Northern Territory and Barkly/Lower Top End north of Alice Springs.
At the other end of the scale, regions exhibiting very low wellbeing are often in the inner city.
On an overall State/Territory comparative basis, where the relative proportion of high and low SSDs are taken into consideration, South Australia is clearly the best and New South Wales is clearly the worst, in relation to wellbeing.
While the relationship between wellbeing and population size was one of the most prominent findings from the report, the research also looked at a number of other demographic characteristics.
For example, even in remote areas of the Northern Territory where health is an issue, the size of the Indigenous population in a SSD is irrelevant to wellbeing.
The research also suggests that once the proportion of people not born in Australia exceeds 40 per cent of the population in a SSD, wellbeing starts to fall.
“This appears to be caused by a lack of connection to the community, however it is important to note that this is a preliminary finding and there is definitely room for further research in this area,” Professor Cummins said.
A further finding of the report shows that the SSDs with high wellbeing are likely to have more married and older inhabitants.
These areas also tend to have lower household income, which demonstrates that the relative wealth of the area is not the major criterion for high wellbeing.
For further information visit www.australianunity.com.au/wellbeingindex/
