Analysis

The Cantril Self-Anchoring Striving Scale was designed to assess individuals’ subjective well-being and life satisfaction. This scale allows people to place themselves on a ladder from the worst to the best possible level of life, based on their own aspirations and goals.

Purpose

The main purpose of the scale is to provide a simple and easily understandable measure of subjective well-being and life satisfaction. The data collected can be used to understand the factors that influence well-being and to develop interventions aimed at improving quality of life.

Calibration

Participants are presented with a 10-step scale, where step 1 represents the worst possible level of life and step 10 the best possible level of life. Participants are asked to place themselves on a step that represents their current level of life and on another step that represents the level of life they expect to have in the future (usually in five years).

References

Cantril, H. (1965). The pattern of human concerns. Rutgers University Press.
Diener, E., Emmons, R. A., Larsen, R. J., & Griffin, S. (1985). The Satisfaction With Life Scale. Journal of Personality Assessment, 49(1), 71-75.
Kahneman, D., & Deaton, A. (2010). High income improves evaluation of life but not emotional well-being. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 107(38), 16489-16493.
Kahneman, D., & Krueger, A. B. (2006). Developments in the measurement of subjective well-being. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 20(1), 3-24.
Huppert, F. A., & So, T. T. C. (2013). Flourishing across Europe: Application of a new conceptual framework for defining well-being. Social Indicators Research, 110(3), 837-861.