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Self-reported Life Satisfaction and Response StyleDifferences Among Children in Chile and SwedenAbstractThe purpose of the current study was to assess self-perceived life satisfaction in Chilean and Swedishchildren. The total sample consisted of a non-clinical sample of 1,352 school children between 8 and 14years of age. Analyses were carried out to compare the children’s subjective quality of life and lifesatisfaction. In addition, possible response style differences across the two countries were explored. Basedon our findings, no difference was found between the two countries for the total life satisfaction score, andthe only area on which the Swedish children had a significantly higher rating than the Chilean children wason their satisfaction with their friends. However, the Chilean children reported a higher satisfaction withtheir siblings, school and health than the Swedish children. Moreover, an interaction effect was foundbetween country and age group on the school variable, with the three age groups in the Swedish samplebeing significantly different, whereas no significant difference was found between the age groups on thisvariable among the Chilean children. Overall, the satisfaction with the children’s different life areasdecreased, as they grew older, whereas gender differences were only found on three variables. Smallsignificant response style differences were found between the Chilean and Swedish children. As the effectsizes of these differences were quite small, they should be viewed with caution, and are not likely to explainthe few differences found between the children. How I Feel about Things seems fully adequate for useacross normal non-clinical boys and girls belonging to different age groups and living in different countriesin order to assess their self-reported life satisfaction.

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Within this Article1. Introduction

2. Method

3. Results

4. Discussion

5. References

6. References

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About this Article

TitleSelf-reported Life Satisfaction and Response Style Differences Among Children in Chile andSweden

JournalJournal of Child and Family Studies

DOI10.1007/s10826-013-9814-2

Print ISSN1062-1024

Online ISSN1573-2843

PublisherSpringer US

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7/5/2014 Self-reported Life Satisfaction and Response Style Differences Among Children in Chile and Sweden - Online First - Springer

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Topics

Child and School Psychology

Social Sciences, general

Sociology, general

Keywords

Life satisfaction

Quality of life

Cross-cultural

Response styles

School children

Authors

Lisa Clefberg Liberman (1)

Karolina Larsson (2)

María Paz Altuzarra (1)

Lars-Göran Öst (2)

Thomas Ollendick (3)

Author Affiliations

1. Department of Psychology, Universidad de los Andes, 2200 Av. San Carlos deApoquindo, Las Condes, Santiago, Chile

2. Department of Psychology, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden

3. Department of Psychology, Child Study Center, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA,USA

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