Happiness and its Contributory Factors:A Study on Urban Youth Population

The present study explores the roles of Life Regard, Relational Interdependence Self Construal, Social Support and Spirituality in the development of Happiness among 100 adult individuals (50 males and 50 females), age ranging from 20 to 35. The participants completed Oxford Happiness Questionnaire (Hills & Argyle, 2002), Life Regard Index (Battista & Almond, 1973), The Relational-Interdependent Self-Construal & Relationships (Cross et al., 2000), Social Support Questionnaire, short form (Sarason et al., 1987) and Spiritual Involvement and Belief Scale (Hatch et al., 1998). The data were analyzed using Stepwise Multiple Regression Analysis (SMRA). Males and females are treated as two separate groups. Results indicated, among males, life regard and relational interdependence self construal were the two contributory variables for Happiness. Among females, life regard and Social Support were found to be the contributory factors. Life Regard is found to be the common contributory factor for both the genders. This emphasizes the finding that meaning in life helps to attain Happiness for both groups. This particular research helps us to know how perception of happiness changes with gender difference.