Deep Dive

Wellbeing indicators should measure what they are intended to measure and should be relevant to the specific context and community.

Changes in wellbeing indicators should reflect real-life changes rather than measurement error.

Wellbeing indicators should allow for effective communication, being easy to understand and interpret, both by policymakers and the general public. The desired sense of direction for each indicator should be clear, for example with a higher value on the indicator reflecting a higher level of wellbeing (or vice versa).

Wellbeing indicators should be able to detect improvements or deteriorations in wellbeing over time.

Wellbeing indicators should be able to be broken down for specific groups of interest to look at the distribution of outcomes.

While data availability is an important consideration in the selection of indicators, if data is not available this should be a motivation to collect data to inform this indicator, rather than deleting this indicator from the list. Ideally, wellbeing indicators should be available without too long a delay and need to be able to provide information on changes over time.

It can be helpful if wellbeing indicators are comparable to other relevant data sets (e.g., using the same survey questions), so that the indicators can be put into a broader context.

This does not mean that all indicators need to be comparable to other data collections. Taken together, wellbeing indicators should meaningfully reflect local knowledge and perspectives on wellbeing.

If the wellbeing assessment is conducted in a multicultural context, indicators should be applicable across diverse groups and communities.

This final criterion for indicator selection refers to the suite of indicators as a whole. The more indicators that are included, the harder it is to make sense of the overall picture. While detailed analysis for specific wellbeing domains is important, the indicators in wellbeing frameworks are intended as a core set of indicators that reflect the key dimensions of wellbeing that are considered as important by the local community or society, covering notions of current wellbeing, inclusion and sustainability.