Does Jev know where people say they're happy?

For each of about 100 countries, what share of people say they are very or quite happy in its latest World Values Survey or European Values Study, and does Jev know?

result109 questions

Asked what share of people in each of 109 countries told the World Values Survey they were "very happy" or "quite happy", Jev guesses 28 points too low on average, and ranks the countries only moderately like the surveys (rank correlation 0.51). It is furthest off in countries it probably pictures as places of hardship: Lebanon (30% vs 86%), Myanmar (35% vs 88%) and Libya (40% vs 92%). Only for Zambia does it guess too high (60% vs 52%).

How to read this: Each dot is a country. Across: the share who said they were very or quite happy in its latest survey. Up: Jev's guess. Nearly every dot is far below the diagonal.

109 countries; 90% interval on the mean error [-29.21, -26.15] points.

In short

Jev badly underestimates how happy people say they are, guessing 28 points too low on average across 109 countries in the values surveys.
The misses are largest where Jev likely pictures hardship: Lebanon 30% against 86%, Myanmar 35% against 88%, Libya 40% against 92%.
The question did not list the survey's four answers, which may explain part of the gap, but not Norway at 75% against 94%.

What the data shows

Crying cat meme: Jev, guessing how happy people are: 28 points too gloomy, on average — Jev, guessing how happy people are: 28 points too gloomy, on average

Jev is far too gloomy: 28 points too low on average (90% interval 26 to 29 points), in almost every country.
Even the happiest countries: Norway 75% for Jev against 94% in the survey; Canada 65% against 85%.
Worst where life is hard: Lebanon 30% against 86%, Myanmar 35% against 88%, Libya 40% against 92%.
It ranks countries only moderately like the surveys (0.51). Its guesses spread about as widely as the real shares, just shifted down.
Zambia is the one country it guesses too high (60% against 52% in 2010).

What it means, and what it doesn't

Jev underestimates how readily people everywhere call themselves happy, and most of all in countries marked by crisis or conflict, exactly where the survey finds people surprisingly resilient in how they describe their lives.

It doesn't mean Jev thinks people are miserable in a deep sense; part of the gap may come from the project's question not listing the survey's four answers (see Caveats). A rerun that spells out the answer options would show how much.

Caveats

The question didn't list the survey's answers. The question named the two happy answers but didn't say the survey offers only four: very happy, quite happy, not very happy, not at all happy, with no neutral middle. If Jev pictured a "neither" option, its share would come out low for every country. That could explain part of the gap; it can't explain all of it, since Jev guesses only 75% even for Norway, where 94% said they were happy.
Different years. Each country's figure is from its latest survey since 2010, so years differ (Zambia's is from 2010, Lebanon's from 2022). The question names the survey year, but moods change with events.
Saying you're happy isn't the same as being happy. The survey records what people say in an interview. Cultures differ in how readily people call themselves happy, which is part of what makes the real shares surprising, and part of what Jev may be discounting.

Jev on this experiment

Would a person find it interesting to read?: Yes80%
Does it describe you?: No72%
Would you have predicted it?: Yes56%
How fair is the comparison?: The comparison is reasonable
How much should a reader rely on it?: Mostly
Which caveat matters most?: The question didn't list the survey's answers47%

Why ask this

In most countries, most people tell surveyors they are at least "quite happy", including in many poor or troubled places. It's one of the more surprising facts in survey research, and the share still varies widely from country to country.

A model's guess about how happy people are in a place reveals its mental picture of that place. Guessing low everywhere, or assuming misery wherever it assumes poverty or conflict, would color everything it writes about the world's people.

How this was done

The people and the data

The World Values Survey and the European Values Study interview representative samples of adults in dozens of countries every few years. One question asks: taking all things together, would you say you are very happy, quite happy, not very happy or not at all happy? This experiment uses the share saying very or quite happy, as compiled by Our World in Data, at each country's latest survey since 2010: 109 countries, surveyed in different years between 2010 and 2023.

What Jev was asked

In the 2022 World Values Survey or European Values Study in Lebanon, what share of people said they were "very happy" or "quite happy"?
0% · 5% · 10% · ... · 95% · 100%

(The answer: 86%. Jev said 30%.) Each question was asked with the answer steps in three shuffled orders, and the answers averaged.

How it was measured

Jev's median guess against the published share for each country: how far off it is on average, in which direction, and whether it ranks the countries in the same order (rank correlation: 1 means the same order).

Where these questions live

109 questions across 1 topic of the map. Each opens on the map with every question in it.

Countries

Trust and Happiness by Country109

Every question

All 109 questions behind this result, the telling ones first: the examples the analysis points to, then the ones where Jev misses, biggest gap first.

Jev’s own answer

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