Interesting! I think figure 2.1 here provides a partial answer. According to the FAQ:
“the sub-bars show the estimated extent to which each of the six factors (levels of GDP, life expectancy, generosity, social support, freedom, and corruption) is estimated to contribute to making life evaluations higher in each country than in Dystopia. Dystopia is a hypothetical country with values equal to the world’s lowest national averages for each of the six factors (see FAQs: What is Dystopia?). The sub-bars have no impact on the total score reported for each country but are just a way of explaining the implications of the model estimated in Table 2.1. People often ask why some countries rank higher than others—the sub-bars (including the residuals, which show what is not explained) attempt to answer that question.”
India seems to score very low on social support, compared to similarly ranked countries.
I did some googling and found this, which shows the sub-factors over time for India. Looks like social support declined a lot, but is now increasing again.
I haven’t checked whether it declined more than in other countries and, if it has, I’m not sure why it has.
Your second link helped me refine my line of questioning / confusion. You’re right that social support declined a lot, but the sum of the six key variables (GDP per capita, etc) still mostly trended upwards over time, huge covid dip aside, which is what I’d expect in the India development success story.
It’s the dystopia residual that keeps dropping, from 2.275 − 1.83 = 0.445 in 2015 (i.e. Indians reported 0.445 points higher life satisfaction than you’d predict using the model) to 0.979 − 1.83 = −0.85, an absolute plummeting of life satisfaction across a sizeable fraction of the world population, that’s for some reason not explained by the six key variables. Hm…
(please don’t feel obliged to respond – I appreciate the link!)
Interesting! I think figure 2.1 here provides a partial answer. According to the FAQ:
“the sub-bars show the estimated extent to which each of the six factors (levels of GDP, life expectancy, generosity, social support, freedom, and corruption) is estimated to contribute to making life evaluations higher in each country than in Dystopia. Dystopia is a hypothetical country with values equal to the world’s lowest national averages for each of the six factors (see FAQs: What is Dystopia?). The sub-bars have no impact on the total score reported for each country but are just a way of explaining the implications of the model estimated in Table 2.1. People often ask why some countries rank higher than others—the sub-bars (including the residuals, which show what is not explained) attempt to answer that question.”
India seems to score very low on social support, compared to similarly ranked countries.
I did some googling and found this, which shows the sub-factors over time for India. Looks like social support declined a lot, but is now increasing again.
I haven’t checked whether it declined more than in other countries and, if it has, I’m not sure why it has.
Thank you for the pointer!
Your second link helped me refine my line of questioning / confusion. You’re right that social support declined a lot, but the sum of the six key variables (GDP per capita, etc) still mostly trended upwards over time, huge covid dip aside, which is what I’d expect in the India development success story.
It’s the dystopia residual that keeps dropping, from 2.275 − 1.83 = 0.445 in 2015 (i.e. Indians reported 0.445 points higher life satisfaction than you’d predict using the model) to 0.979 − 1.83 = −0.85, an absolute plummeting of life satisfaction across a sizeable fraction of the world population, that’s for some reason not explained by the six key variables. Hm…
(please don’t feel obliged to respond – I appreciate the link!)