The impact of unemployment on cognitive, affective, and eudaimonic well-being facets: Investigating immediate effects and short-term adaptation.

Abstract

While long-lasting declines in life satisfaction following unemployment have been well documented, evidence on the impact of unemployment on affective and eudaimonic well-being is scarce. Moreover, most existing studies relied on yearly panel data and were unable to separate the immediate effects of entering unemployment from prospective effects occurring before individuals become unemployed. The present study identified the immediate effects of entering unemployment on cognitive, affective and eudaimonic well-being facets using a control-group design based on monthly panel data of initially employed German jobseekers who were at high risk of losing their job. In order to investigate patterns of short-term adaptation, the study further examined whether average well-being levels change within the first months of unemployment using a mixed-effects trait-state-occasion model. All effects were separately computed for jobseekers affected by mass-layoffs or plant closures and individuals who registered as jobseekers due to other reasons. Multi-item instruments and experience sampling were used to validly measure the various well-being facets. The results indicate that life satisfaction and income satisfaction significantly decreased for individuals affected by masslayoffs or plant closures from the last month in employment to the first month in unemployment. For individuals who registered as jobseekers due to other reasons, these effects were smaller and not significant in the case of life satisfaction. Crucially, there were no immediate effects of entering unemployment on the examined affective and eudaimonic well-being facets. Moreover, well-being levels were generally stable within the first months of unemployment indicating a general absence of short-term adaptation.

Examining interindividual differences in unemployment-related changes in subjective well-being: The role of psychological well-being and re-employment expectations

“…In terms of unemployment, extensive research showed that entering unemployment is on average associated with declining life satisfaction (Clark et al, 2008;Lawes, Hetschko, Schöb, et al, 2022;Luhmann et al, 2012). Moreover, becoming unemployed has been shown to be related to decreases in satisfaction with one's income (Chadi & Hetschko, 2017;Lawes, Hetschko, Schöb, et al, 2022) and social life (Powdthavee, 2012). Contrarily, positive effects of unemployment were found in terms of increased satisfaction with one's leisure time and family life (Chadi & Hetschko, 2017).…”

“…Panel studies utilizing retrospective assessments of AWB indicated that unemployment has negative effects on sadness, happiness, and anxiety (von Scheve et al, 2017) as well as mood (Hentschel et al, 2017). Contrarily, studies that measured AWB with the experience sampling method (ESM, Hektner et al, 2007) or the day reconstruction method (DRM, Kahneman et al, 2004), which are less prone to recall biases compared to classical questionnaires, found no systematic effects of unemployment on various AWB facets (Dolan et al, 2017;Hoang & Knabe, 2021;Lawes, Hetschko, Schöb, et al, 2022;Wolf et al, 2022).…”

“…Only items 1, 2 and 3 of the SWLS were used in the present study because items 4 and 5 have poorer psychometric properties (Diener et al, 1985;Kjell & Diener, 2021;Pavot & Diener, 2009) and refer to longer time periods (e.g., "If I could live my life over, I would change almost nothing."). The single-item reliabilities of the three items were computed for the full GJSP sample at the first measurement wave and ranged from .70 to .86 (Lawes, Hetschko, Schöb, et al, 2022).…”

“…In cases where the same number of ESM episodes were submitted on both ESM days, we used the responses of the initial ESM day. The reliabilities of the six MDSQ items averaged across the ESM episodes of the first measurement wave was computed for the full GJSP and ranged from .74 to .83 (Lawes, Hetschko, Schöb, et al, 2022).…”

There’s More in the Data! Using Month-Specific Information to Estimate Changes Before and After Major Life Events

“…Finally, Lawes et al (2022) were specifically interested in the immediate effect of unemployment on well-being and estimated month-to-month changes. However, the data they analyzed differed from those of most other studies: they used a high-frequency panel where individuals were indeed interviewed at monthly intervals.…”