Rural residents tend to report higher subjective well-being than urban residents in developed countries; higher bonding social capital in rural areas and higher access to nature amenities contribute

The rural happiness paradox in developed countries. Jens F.L. Sørensen. Social Science Research, May 25 2021, 102581. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssresearch.2021.102581

Highlights

• Research points to higher well-being among rural dwellers in developed counties.

• This tendency in previous findings can be termed the rural happiness paradox (RHP).

• The RHP is robustly confirmed in Denmark using three rural-urban classifications.

• The paper tests three hypotheses regarding the possible causes of the RHP.

• Differences in social capital and access to nature are main factors behind the RHP.

Abstract: In this paper, a national Danish survey is used to explore the rural happiness paradox in developed countries. This paradox revolves around the observation that rural residents tend to report higher subjective well-being than urban residents in developed countries. Based on three different rural-urban classifications, the paper provides a solid confirmation of the rural happiness paradox in Denmark. The paper tests three hypotheses regarding the factors behind the rural happiness paradox and finds strong support for two of the hypotheses. Thus, higher bonding social capital in rural areas and higher access to nature amenities in rural areas were found to contribute to the rural happiness paradox in Denmark. As for the third hypothesis, the paper finds no significant evidence that rural-urban differences in spatial location satisfaction (measured by the correspondence between actual and preferred residential location on the rural-urban continuum) contribute to the rural happiness paradox in Denmark.

Keywords: Rural happiness paradoxSocial capitalNature amenitiesSpatial location satisfactionDenmark

7. Conclusion

In this paper, a unique Danish survey was used to explore the rural happiness paradox in developed countries. This paradox revolves around the observation that rural residents tend to report higher subjective well-being than urban residents in developed countries, whereas the opposite is the case generally for developing counties (Easterlin et al., 2011; Requena, 2016). By using three rural-urban classifications, the paper provides a solid confirmation of the rural happiness paradox in Denmark. The results show that regardless of rural-urban classification the rural happiness paradox in Denmark is still evident after adjusting for important socioeconomic variables such as gender, age, health, education, employment status, and income.

The paper tests three hypotheses regarding the factors behind the rural happiness paradox. The paper finds that higher bonding social capital in rural areas and higher access to nature amenities in rural areas substantially contribute to the rural happiness paradox in Denmark. However, the paper finds no significant evidence that rural-urban differences in spatial location satisfaction (measured by the correspondence between actual and preferred residential location on the rural-urban continuum) also contribute to the rural happiness paradox. It was hypothesized that urban residents are less satisfied with their choice of residential environment than rural dwellers, and that this would have a downward impact on the subjective well-being of urban residents. However, while the paper did find a significant positive relation between spatial location satisfaction and life satisfaction, spatial location satisfaction in the Danish case did not turn out to be highest per se in rural areas across the three rural-urban classifications.

In the Danish case, the level of education turned out to hardly matter to subjective well-being, and the level of income was not found to be among the most important predictors of subjective well-being. This may be owing to the high economic equality in the Danish society which has been achieved through state-driven wealth redistribution throughout many years. When a relatively generous basic income is secured by the state, soft factors take over and become more important parameters of subjective well-being. Thus, the soft parameters of bonding social capital and access to nature amenities were found to be strong predictors of individual well-being in Denmark. Overall, as rural residents score higher on these two soft parameters, this seems to provide the main explanation of the rural happiness paradox in Denmark. It would be very interesting to see future studies in other developed countries that differ from Denmark addressing the same issues as raised in this paper.