World Happiness Index

The Index Measures the well-being and happiness among the peoples of the world using the following criteria: Social support, Freedom, Corruption, Generosity, GDP per capita, Healthy life expectancy. The report is issued by Sustainable Development Solutions Network every year.

The Global Happiness Index is calculated based on the analysis of the data and questions to the individuals covered by Gallup World Poll, where the people are allowed to express their opinion about the level of satisfaction and well-being. Countries are scored by giving a value from 0 to 10, where 0 indicates the worst or the most unhappy country, and 10 to the happiest country.

Bahrain’s Score has remained consistent through out the year until it dropped again in the last repot of 2023. This is due to the decrease in the score of healthy life expectancy and social support.

Description

The World Happiness Report reflects a worldwide demand for more attention to happiness and well-being as criteria for government policy. It reviews the state of happiness in the world today and shows how the science of happiness explains personal and national variations in happiness.

Methodology

Life evaluations from the Gallup World Poll provide the basis for the annual happiness rankings. The rankings are from nationally representative samples over three years. The indicator observes data on six variables and estimates of their associations with life evaluations to explain the variation across countries. They include GDP per capita, social support, healthy life expectancy, freedom, generosity, and corruption.

World Happiness Index Ranking

Less is Higher

  • Data for Qatar and Oman not available, 2021 Singapore data not available, 2021 & 2023 Kuwait data not available

Annual Index Score

More is better

  • Data for Kuwait 2023 not available

Bahrain’s Ranking in the World Happiness Index has increased from the years 2020 to the year 2022 reaching a ranking of 21. However, Bahrain’s ranking has decreased in the years 2023 and 2024 to a ranking for 42 and 62 respectively.

Bahrain Score has increased in two out of the six factors of the indicator:

      • GDP per capita
        • This factor gives information about the size of the economy and how the economy is performing.
      • Generosity
        • Asks the question “have you donated money to a charity in the past month”
        • A clear marker for a sense of positive community engagement and a central way that humans connect with each other.

The Decrease in ranking it mainly due to three out of six factors of the indicator:

    • Social Support
      • Which focuses on having someone to count on in times of trouble.
    • Healthy Life expectancy at birth
      • If focuses more that life expectancy, but also on physical and mental health.
      • Mental health is a key component of subjective well-being and is also a factor for future physical health and longevity. Mental Health influences and drives a number of individual choices, behaviors and outcomes.
    • Freedom to make life choices
      • Asks the question “are you satisfied or dissatisfied with your freedom to choose what you do with your life”
      • This also include human rights. Inherent to all human beings, regardless of race, sex, nationality, ethnicity, language, religion, or any other status. Human rights include the right to life and liberty, freedom from slavery and torture, freedom of opinion and expression, the right to work and education and many more. Everyone is entitled to these rights without discrimination.