What works to improve life satisfaction in intervention and observational research?

We commissioned Kohlrabi to conduct two distinct yet complementary rapid reviews:

1. Life Satisfaction Intervention Review: Collating international evidence on activities, programmes or services intended to improve individual life satisfaction.
2. Life Satisfaction Determinants Review: Updating the evidence base using observational UK longitudinal data on broad factors that are associated with life satisfaction at a population-level.

The two rapid reviews were conducted in parallel, with complementary inclusion/exclusion criteria, search strategies, extraction and synthesis, and critical appraisal. Where possible, best practices for conducting systematic reviews from the Cochrane Collaboration were followed.

The intervention review primarily identified intrapersonal emotional activities, which were generally associated with improvements in life satisfaction although effect sizes were small.

The observational review identified broader determinants of life satisfaction including socioeconomic circumstances, social capital and health factors.

Together, the reviews offer complementary and comprehensive insight into factors associated with life satisfaction, as outlined in the full report. They identify key targets for improving life satisfaction as well as areas for further research. Addressing overall socioeconomic and health factors at a population-level could complement individual-centric interventions aimed specifically at improving life satisfaction.

This project supports policymakers and commissioners by:

• enhancing their understanding of determinants of life satisfaction;
• increasing the availability of effect sizes for use in policy evaluation and appraisal across various factors of interest.

Appendices

Alongside the main technical report we are have published a number of supplementary materials including comprehensive lists of all the studies included in the two reviews. We have included these as both a reference list (Appendices A and C) and also in an dynamic look-up table which can be filtered by users to find specific studies organised by a range of search criteria (Appendices B and D). The PRISMA checklist for both reviews is available in Appendix E.

Accompanying resources

Alongside the review have published a suite series of downloadable documents:

• A list of the international and COVID-19 studies excluded from the determinants review
• A list of the COVID-19 and borderline populations studies from the intervention review.
• A life satisfaction effect size table for economists and policymakers which summarises the available size effects from both reviews. This can be used to inform policy appraisal and to understand social value.

These products are published in the spirit of aiding future research and policy development. They are working documents and information and data taken from them should be checked against the original studies.

This work was funded by the Department for Transport, Department for Media, Culture and Sport and Cabinet Office.

We would like to thank the review team at Kohlrabi for assistance with screening and extraction and all those from the advisory group and the quality assurance group who gave valuable advice and recommendations during the review process. This includes Richard Crellin, Nancy Hey, Joanne Smithson, Ingrid Abreu Scherer, Sara MacLennan, Margaux Spriet, Eleanor Rees, Mark Fabian, Esteban Ortiz-Ospina, Jon Franklin, Margherita Musella, Andrew Rzepa, Dan Corry, Kelsey O’ Connor, Jessica Mahoney, Andrew Oswald, Matt Harris, Chris Barrington-Leigh, Paul Montgomery, and Ruth Garside.

Blodgett, J., Tiley, K., Kim, E., and Harkness, F. (2024) What works to improve life satisfaction in intervention and observational research? What Works Centre for Wellbeing. Available at: https://whatworkswellbeing.org/resources/

Written content is available under the Creative Commons licence CC BY-NC-SA 4