Suchergebnisse

The paper investigates the influence of various demographic and social factors on the perception of well-being in Hungary. For the purpose of the analysis, various measures of subjective well-being have been developed, as dependent variables, using both narrower and broader set of items, and principal factor analysis was applied to construct normalised indices. Demographic predictors include gender, age, family composition, residence; sociological predictors contain education, labour market position, income and wealth as well as questions on health and religiosity.Hungary is an interesting case to study, given the well-known strong deficit in subjective well-being. The phenomenon is particularly motivating in the light of the official propaganda by the governing political forces on the country's economic and social progress. Low level of subjective well-being is confirmed again, partly in international comparison, partly from the perspective of temporal change. Furthermore, detailed analysis of the data reveals that Hungarians seem to be markedly divided by age, residence and social status for higher or lower assessment of well-being. Regression models prove that material conditions have the strongest impact on subjective well-being, even if controlled for education and labour market position. The results on subjective-wellbeing raise questions for public policy in Hungary.

The paper investigates the influence of various demographic and social factors on the perception of well-being in Hungary. For the purpose of the analysis, various measures of subjective well-being have been developed, as dependent variables, using both narrower and broader set of items, and principal factor analysis was applied to construct normalised indices. Demographic predictors include gender, age, family composition, residence; sociological predictors contain education, labour market position, income and wealth as well as questions on health and religiosity. Hungary is an interesting case to study, given the well-known strong deficit in subjective well-being. The phenomenon is particularly motivating in the light of the official propaganda by the governing political forces on the country's economic and social progress. Low level of subjective well-being is confirmed again, partly in international comparison, partly from the perspective of temporal change. Furthermore, detailed analysis of the data reveals that Hungarians seem to be markedly divided by age, residence and social status for higher or lower assessment of well-being. Regression models prove that material conditions have the strongest impact on subjective well-being, even if controlled for education and labour market position. The results on subjective-wellbeing raise questions for public policy in Hungary.

"This paper deals with the question of when and how lifestyle and its components are important in social stratification. There is considerable consensus among scholars about the structure of the society being a consequence of hierarchical dimensions like occupation, income, or wealth. Some thirty years ago, largely based on Bourdieu's 'Distinction', a new paradigm emerged highlighting the lifestyle components and the value-oriented cultural and material consumption in stratification. The idea reflects the empirical finding that inequality between social classes has largely decreased, giving priority to horizontal lifestyle differentiation instead of vertical inequality dimensions. From a theoretical viewpoint, a challenge in the approach is finding out to what extent lifestyle typology is of a non-vertical character in reality. This social determination of lifestyle is investigated for Hungary when comparing an occupation-based typology with a consumption-based one. On the one hand, results reveal that the effects of structural components on social status are stronger than those of lifestyle. On the other hand, lifestyle turns out to be less independent of social position and the top and bottom levels of the lifestyle typology are particularly predictable by structural measures." (author's abstract)

This study analyses the timing of first entry into marriage of Hungarian men and women born between 1916 and 1967. Marriages take place at a considerably earlier age than the West European average, and at the same time show significant differences between cohorts. In the course of the analysis we consider the social and economic circumstances which affect the timing of entry into marriage, and we connect the variables of men and women's educational attainment with their age at marriage. In each cohort we examine the sociological characteristics of those who marry significantly earlier or later than the average for their generation, i.e. than the "normal" age.