Justice System Position Paper Essay

For many years there has been so much debate on whether punishment or rehabilitation would be the main issue in the juvenile system. They have gone back and forward from punishment to rehabilitation and still to this day it is still going on in our society, in which they should be forcing on rehabilitating our young youth to better themselves because they are our future generation that is coming up, instead of punishing them in which that is not going to help them one bit, only thing that is going to do is continue more problems within our youth. People wonder to this day what method works and I believe that rehabilitation should be the main primary focus in the juvenile justice system. If they really think about it rehabilitation is a program and therapies that allow juveniles delinquent to reunite back to society as a contributing member to their community. The program has many things to offer to help a juvenile and what I mean by this is they have programs that offer behavior modi fication therapies, education, work programs, and counseling to help them correct any area that needs improvement. They also help out the parent to better their juvenile the only thing is the parent have to get involve and really want the help for their juvenile so they can overcome their issue and be reunited back to society. Juvenile justice system should focus more on rehabilitation and the reason why I say that is because it can reduce time spent being incarcerated, also address more for the needs of delinquents, what I mean by this is focusing more on rehabilitation it could allow more delinquent to become productive members in society and in courage them to change their ways of life and prove to them that everyone can change instead of people looking at them as an delinquent juvenile that stay in trouble a lot. Just think if the states think more about punishment than rehabilitation  there would be more repeated offenders, and ultimately, depriving on society and the offender, then if you think about it the offender would be punished for their action as a delinquent but not getting the op portunity to learn how to be reunited back into society as a productive member and not being able to understand there problem, which means they would never understand what tick them off and make them act out the way they do by being punish they would never no and continue to repeat their action. Rehabilitation has a lot to offer far as learning about their behavior and the impact on society, how they can change their behavior, by completing the program they know that they can be successful and find a good job and stay away from trouble due to already going through that situation and be reunited back to society. Now without the program a juvenile could go into adulthood and still continue their action and it may get worse in the future. There was a research done on juvenile justice setting around the world and Day, Howells and Rickwood have inform people that most juvenile that has encounter with criminal justice agencies has many problems and have experience high levels of need and the justice agencies does not have much aware of the circumstance that is going on with the delinquents due to worrying about punishing them instead of finding out what they can do to help them overcome their situation so they can be reunited back to society. I think that rehabilitation should be the main focus on criminal justice system, and the reason why I say this is because the understanding on rehabilitation impact due to the law enforcement, court processes, probation, corrections, community services, and intervention programs. By the successful of the program can impact area’s and who has completed the programs are less likely to repeat breaking the law enforcement. Just think of the juveniles that has completed the rehabilitation program or anyone who has completed the program are less likely to increase the caseload in courts. Then, there are those who are on probation or not, they could have their probation decreased due to upon successful completion of the program. Even with rehabilitation, it can decrease the burden on corrections system by decreasing the number of juveniles that is incarceration. Now with community service and intervention programs could experience an increase in juvenile depending on whether the juvenile comply with their rehabilitation programs and that when the parent is suppose to  get involve to make sure that they juvenile comply within the program. If people can address that some juveniles has committed an unacceptable act and putting them in a rehabilitation program instead of punishing them, which is a inappropriate behavior depending on what type of crime that they have committed and what I mean by this is, if a juvenile committed murder than they should be punish for their crime but at the same time they also should be rehabilitate to understand what they have done was wrong and admit to their action and focus on improving themselves so they can be reunited back in to society one day or prove to themselves and they community that they can be reunited within the community. Think if they just punish all juveniles for their action regardless of what type of crime that they have committed, a juvenile would be accepted to all types of behavior and they would not understand the social or mental processes that may contribute to a delinquency due to being punished and rehabilitation does address these issue and help the delinquency focus on their problems and can help improve them in so many ways but the juvenile would have to want to change for themselves not because they are required to complete the program they have to want to do this on there on and that’s when the parent get involve to courage there juvenile to change to better themselves. Rehabilitation has both advantages and disadvantages and what I mean by this is the advantages of rehabilitation focus on the needs of the offender and customize to the individual’s needs by helping them understand there issue and how they can control there issue. Also the costs are significantly less tha n incarceration and decrease the recidivism rates, just think the juvenile crime rate will decrease and it would not be overcrowded in the detention center. The disadvantages would be adequate staffing and funding due to not having enough or short supply, but all in all the advantages always outweighing the disadvantage due to reducing the numbers of juvenile offender and getting them the help they need to improve themselves so they can be reunited back to society as civilize young adults. The agreement that oppose my view is how some people feel as though punishing the delinquency would help them but in reality it is only making them worse and their behavior also. My opinion is that all delinquency that has commit some type of crime should be able to get help far as rehabilitating them instead of punishing them, just think if they punish all of the delinquency they  would have a lot of juveniles in detention centers and that would be more money spent to house them and that means more staffs being hire to work more hours than what they have to and at the same time having to worry about the different behaviors within the juveniles, at l east with the rehabilitation program they (juveniles) could be able to get the help they need and understand their action and work on their issue to the point that they can be reunited back into society and live a civilize life within their community. Another thing is the juvenile’s parent need to be involve in whatever action that is taking place within their juvenile and what I mean by this is the parent are responsible for them (juvenile) and they should make it there point that they juvenile comply with the program and also participate within the program to better their juvenile, and understand their (juvenile) problem. Parents should understand that it starts with them and if they are not trying to get involve then their juvenile would feel as though they really do not have to comply by the programs. If parents get involve and help the system out by wanting to help there juvenile to improve their issue instead of putting their juvenile problems off on others then may be the juvenile crime rate would decrease and it would not be a big issue on making sure that the juvenile’s comply with rehabilitation programs nor punishing them (juvenile). Just think if rehabilitation service was not provided to the delinquency, it would be a lot of crimes more juvenile’s committing crimes and overcrowding in the detention center, it could hurt the offenders and the community. The juvenile would feel as though that people has lost faith in them and at the same time bring their self esteem down which would convince them do go out and commit crimes due to not having anyone there in there corner, that is why people and parent’s should get involve and help out our youth and make sure that they can be reunited back to society instead of punishing them cause punishing them is not doing anything to help them one bit. Overall I think that the juvenile justice system should focus on rehabilitating our young youth to better them into going back to school and getting a diploma or GED so they can farther there education and find a decent job, instead of getting into trouble and in up in the system to be punish for their crime or repeating the same crime that they have done once before also the community needs to come to gather and help far as giving some type of positive advice to the young youth so  they can follow the right path, but most important is the p arent’s need to be involve in their youth live regardless what it is, just my opinion on the whole situation. Reference American Civil Liberties, (1996, July5). ACLU Fact sheet on The Juvenile Justice System, retrieved, May 10, 2009 www.adu.org/crimjustice/juv/10091res19960705.com A History Struggle: Punishment or Rehabilitation? Mellen G. (2008, May 20), Press- Telegram, retrieved, May 10, 2009 www.prestelegram.com/justice/ci_9327709.com Public Willing to Pay More for Rehabilitation of Juvenile Offenders; Models for Change: System Reform in Juvenile Justice, (2009). In Models for Change; System Reform in Juvenile Justice; Home, retrieved May 10, 2009 www.modelsforchange.net/newsroom/18.com Juvenile Law Focus is Rehabilitation; Children are Considered, David J. Shestokas, copyright May 18, 2009 www.peasecurity,suite101.com/article.cfm/juvenile_law_foc.com Rehabilitation and Control of Juvenile Delinquency Offender, Afolabi James Adebayo, copyright 2010 www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/2000/2/00.02.01.x.h.com

Mgmt Quiz

1. While there are many routes to competitive advantage, they all involve B. delivering superior value to buyers in ways rivals cannot readily match. 2. A low-cost leader can translate its low-cost advantage over rivals into superior profit performance by B. either using its low-cost edge to underprice competitors and attract price sensitive buyers in large enough numbers to increase total profits or refraining from price-cutting and using the low-cost advantage to earn a bigger profit margin on each unit sold. 3. The major avenues for achieving a cost advantage over rivals include A. liminating or curbing non-essential cost-producing activities and performing essential value chain activities more cost-effectively that rivals. Â   4. A differentiation-based competitive advantage E. often hinges on incorporating features that (1) raise the performance of the product or (2) lower the buyer's overall costs of using the company's product or (3) enhance buyer satisfaction in intangible or non-economic ways or (4) deliver value to customers by exploiting competitive capabilities that rivals can't match. 5.Which of the following is not one of the pitfalls of a low-cost provider strategy? B. Using a cost-based advantage to improve the company's bargaining position with high-volume buyers 6. Opportunities to differentiate a company's product offering C. can exist in supply chain activities, R, manufacturing activities, distribution and shipping or marketing, sales and customer service. 7. In which of the following circumstances is a strategy to be the industry's overall low-cost provider not particularly well matched to the market situation?When buyers have widely varying needs and special requirements and when the cost of switching purchases from one seller to another are relatively high.8. The objective of competitive strategy is to B. build advantage in the marketplace by giving buyers superior value relative the offerings of rival sellers.9. Successful differentiation allows a firm to D. command a premium price for its product and/or increase unit sales and/or gain buyer loyalty to its brand.10. The generic types of competitive strategies include C. ow-cost provider, broad differentiation, focused low-cost, focused differentiation and best cost provider strategies.11. Easy-to-copy differentiating features A. do not offer the promise of sustainable competitive advantage.12. A competitive strategy to be the low-cost provider in an industry works well when E. All of these.13. The most appealing approaches to differentiation are E. those that are tough for rivals to duplicate and that also have considerable buyer appeal. Read also Quiz Week 414. A company that succeeds in differentiating its product offering from those of its rivals can usually E.All of the above.15. A strategy to be the industry's overall low-cost provider tends to be more appealing than a differentiation or focus strategy when C. the offerings of rival firms are essentially identical, standardized, commodity-like products.16. Which of the following is not one of the five generic types of competitive strategy? E. A market share dominator strategy17. Perceived value and signaling value are often an important part of a successful differentiation strategy when E. All of these.18. A competitive strategy of striving to be the low-cost provider is particularly attractive when E. switching costs are high, price competition is strong, and buyers tend to use the industry's products in many different ways.19. A low-cost leader's basis for competitive advantage is D. meaningfully lower overall costs than competitors.20. A company's competitive strategy deals with A. management's game plan for securing a competitive advantage relative to rivals.

Anne Frank: Injustice Essay

An injustice can be defined as a violation of another’s rights. In literature, authors use the element of injustices as the vocal point of the story. The importance of a vocal point is pivotal in a story because it is the skeleton of the piece. The story is founded upon the existence of the injustice and the events that occur because of it. But in some cases the literary piece is not a fictional story. Not only does it occur in literature, it occurs in real life. The world’s history is plagued with unfairness and inhumane acts of injustice. For instance, the genocide of Jewish people occurred because of Adolph Hitler and his acts of cruelty. The Diary of Anne Frank showcases the injustice she, along with others, endured for the sake of their survival. She suffered a racial injustice, but the biggest injustice is that she did not survive after all the wasted time she spent trying to live normally. Because of the Nazi regime, Anne, her family, and the van Daans, had to hide in a secret annex in order to escape the Nazi’s wrath against the Jews. Anne was kept in isolation against her will because it was the only way she could survive. Unfortunately, Anne either had to physically die at a concentration camp or mentally die inside the annex. She spent two years in that annex; she was forced to grow up in that annex and miss out on opportunities that other children had. She never had the ability to actually live like a normal teenage girl and experience normality. After a while, the definition of normality fades. She has a different perspective on what is normal for her because she is stuck in an annex where she does not thrive or excel in normalcy. Her mind is altered of what humanity and love are. She is practically brainwashed because she does not know how to be normal since all she knows is of what is inside that little annex. At one point, she feels alone and hopeless. She battles between the idea that maybe getting caught would of been the better option because the hell she is stuck in is not any better. As a human being, she deserved to have rights but she had all of those rights taken away from her. It was unfair that she had lost her life and her identity in the real world. Basically, she died when she stepped into that isolated realm; she had no options or any rights. She died either way because no one deserves to live in agony. After all the suffering she endured, she still did not make it and that is the greatest injustice of all. She fought to survive but all her efforts proved to be futile against the wrath of unfairness. After facing so many hardships and pain, she still did not survive. She lost every drop of hope towards the end of her diary. Anne knew her fate either way; if she survived through the annex, she still would not be the same. She could not escape this injustice no matter what she tried. Her life became defined by this injustice; her world revolved around this injustice and she could never escape its grip. She was Jewish no matter what. And because of her heritage, this injustice would never leave her. An injustice can be used throughout a literary work. Unfortunately, injustices manifest into the real world to excrete pain and suffering on its victims. The Diary of Anne Frank illuminates the tragic affects of what an injustice can do to a person. She tried to survive against the odds, but it proved to be meaningless because she died when Hitler proclaimed the Jews inferior.

Personal and Professional Development Assignment - 12

Personal and Professional Development - Assignment Example So, I need to create a mindmap regarding self management of my learning and career in art. After setting my ultimate goal in life, I have set up short-term goal at various levels such as personal, educational, artistic, financial and so on with a definite time limit, which will enable to achieve big target of my life. After that, I always keep updating a to-do-list on daily basis to achieve my short-term goals (Developing Personal and Professional Skills | Faint Apogee - Academia.edu. 2015). I continue to reflect on my work with SWOT analysis of personality at regular intervals. This is best way to analyze the situation in hand and plan for next day. The regular SWOT analysis enables me to remind myself about my goal in life and remove any distraction which is impeding my progress towards the goal. I use most of the mediums for study of art which are available today such as regular lectures and mentoring in collage, visit galleries during exhibitions, interview artists when they are available and read miscellaneous art books in my spare time. I also browse art sites on internet and keep in touch with various artists on social networking sites and attend art workshops (Developing Personal and Professional Skills | Faint Apogee - Academia.edu. 2015). For staying on track, I need to review my goals and my achievement from time to time in an honest manner. For self-assessment, I am objective, honest, a relaxed manner and quiet environment among other things to assess strength and weakness. This is required for increasing commitment to set goals develop competencies in weak areas. There are many self assessment tools in market which are easy to access and thorough but, I like to do my self-appraisal with a very well known assessment tool which is used all over the world by companies regardless of their size and structure. This self assessment tool is known as SWOT analysis. Normally, this self- assessment tools is used

Policies and practice in health Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2750 words

Policies and practice in health - Essay Example Diabetes could cause several harmful and long term impacts upon the human health due to which the importance of combating this problem with the help of adequate health policy has been widely realized. The healthcare professionals and healthcare policy makers widely agree that it is very imperative to formulate and implement sound policies and health plan to address the issues and concerns associated with the human health and diabetes effects (Ekoke et al, 2001, p98). In United Kingdom the prevalence of diabetes has considerable increased over the last few decades and every passing year is adding thousands of people in the list of diabetic patients in the country. The situation is becoming worst with each passing day because the problems of obesity and overweighting have also become problem due to which the type2 diabetes is also becoming very common among the people. Since the ratio of diabetes has been continuously increasing with alarming rate, the situation demands the wakeup call by the health campaigners so that this ratio could be reduced and the main factors behind the increase in diabetes cases could be worked out (Diabetes UK, 2001, p83). ... sing numbers of diabetic patients in the country has built pressure upon NHS because it has the responsibility of formulating policies to prevent the accordance of such diseases with such a high rate. While responding to this critical need NHS has worked on several strategic healthcare plans to assure the safety of the citizens from diabetes and other health problems that could evolve from diabetes (Hoffman R et al, 2002, p1748). NHS has demonstrated that the main objective of its health plan related with diabetes is based upon the objective of reducing the number of diabetes patient and improving the care for the people suffering from this disease. NHS diabetes policy aims to develop partnership with the healthcare staff so that these people could also be motivated and properly trained to deal with the people having diabetes (Department of Health, 2010, p23). The National Health Service plan for diabetes instructs the healthcare staff to offer structures and proactive care to the pe ople so that they could be able to manage their own health conditions at their own by taking adequate care of their disease through proper awareness and information about diabetes. NHS has also set up several local diabetes networks to robust the mechanism and policies implemented at the national level so that the benefits of the policies could be spread at local level as well. In this regard, NHS has worked for joint working relations between the Local Health Boards and the Local Diabetes Service Advisory Groups. The place register and clinical management system are also assured within the healthcare centres to allow systematic management and monitoring of the healthcare policies and their outcomes (Department of Health, 2010, p23). There have been several important plans and policies

Cloning Brachyury from SW480 in pNEB193 plasmid Essay - 2

Cloning Brachyury from SW480 in pNEB193 plasmid - Essay Example This concentration permitted me to proceed on to the next step of the experiment as it had more than 500 ng of RNA. However, it was noted that some students obtained very low concentrations of 15 ng/ ÃŽ ¼L compared to the class average of 169.3 ng/ ÃŽ ¼L. If the class results are analyzed, it can be noted that the standard deviation of this experiment is 151, hence, the range of results is (169 +/− 151) 18 – 320. Table 1 shows that sample F concentration. Nevertheless, samples H, L for example are much higher than the range of the results. The key point of the experiment which determined if the experiment could go on or not was the quality of RNA. That is depicted in figure1: gel denaturation of RNA, the ratio between 28S and 18S RNA is 1.3 – 2.5; many of the students had this value while some were not due to sample degradation or they did not load their samples in the appropriate wells. 3 – The second experiment was the cDNA synthesis where RT – PCR (SuperScript III RT) was used to synthesis it from RNA which was determined by the students as B, D, E, G K O and P. Every student began with a concentration of 6.16 ng. After the synthesis of cDNA, the concentration of the the whole sample was measured by the demonstrator using a Nanodrop. The data of the whole class was very close to the average 747 .2 ng/ ÃŽ ¼L (table 2). The standard deviation was 131.2 which were very small. Thus, almost all students did the experiment correctly as the results of the class data were in the range of 547 – 631 ng/ ÃŽ ¼L. On my part, the sample obtained was 302 ng/ ÃŽ ¼L which also was in the range. This allowed all students to go on to the next experiment. 4 – The next step of the experiment involved the use of the PCR to amplify the full length of Brachyury and human ÃŽ ² – actin from the cDNA that was obtained. Using 0.8% agarose gel electrophoresis, the products of the PCR were analyzed. The PCR in my group worked and had

Discuss a detail summary of chapters 3, 4, and 5 in the book The Essay

Discuss a detail summary of chapters 3, 4, and 5 in the book The Economics of Women, Men, and Work, Blau, Ferber, & Winkler, 6 - Essay Example In this book, the gender roles and issues has been covered extensively in both the workplace and the family as one economic unit, shifting roles in this varying economy, the distribution of time to the workplace and the family, and the gender differences in diverse economies. In this book, the excellent picture of the dispersion of gender in an average family structure and the working culture is manifested. This is one of the most famous and popular books on the subject of socio-economic science, which have been of great help to the study of the scholars as well as educating the general people. In this paper, we are going to look at three specific chapters, viz. chapter 3, 4 and 5, from the book. These three chapters teach about the family as an economic unit, allocation of time between labor market and family, and an overview of differences in occupations and the respective earnings. Chapter 3: Family as an economic unit In the chapter three, the most important subject of discussion was the neoclassical economics. Neoclassical economics deals with the theory that economic constraints actually lead to sustained and steady growth, where the ratio of the capital to every micro economical unit is constrained. In this case, we are talking about the family economic unit. Along with that, topics of specialization and exchange have been conferred in detail. The chapter has also shown the economic consequences of marriage along with the various ways of how a family can work to maximize their economic bargaining power. This chapter deals with sociology, psychology and economics in a household, and provides a great depth into the workings of the regular life. Chapter 4: Allocation of time between family and workplace In the fourth chapter, it starts discussing with the definition of labor market, types of labor market, dispositions of any labor market, and the general work culture. It also discussed various issues such as the market time, the non-market, their significan ces, their advantages and disadvantages, and their effect on the household life. Labor working hours trends have been dedicated a full section for this purpose. But the primary focus of this chapter is the surge of women in the labor force. It started during the World War II, and since then, the general gender structure in an ordinary workplace has tremendously changed over the time – married mothers with older children after the World War, married mothers with younger children in the 1960s-80s, and single and unmarried women in 1990s-2000s. It has taken a huge leap towards the liberalization and increased participation of women in the work force. Even the employment disparities of the black community are discussed in detail. Chapter 5: Differences in occupations and the respective earnings Although the name of the chapter gives an impression that it is focused on the various occupations, and the possibilities of income respectively, the chapter deals with something more than that. It starts with the definition of human capital, and then steers off to the gender biases in the field of human capital investment. Whether in the field of education, job trainings or occupations, there have always been significant biases against certain genders. In this chapter, it strives to throw light on that aspect of education and occupation. Though it can be said that the most part of the chapter

Discussion 7 international relations Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Discussion 7 international relations - Essay Example 47). Kant’s article thus has promoted a unique cosmopolitan approach to developing an international law that all individuals possess equal rights regardless of the country they belong to. His work put forward specific three articles about perpetual peace among nations, they are, a) republican-character of every states’ civil constitution, b) law of nations as being federation of free states, and c) world citizenship as conditions of universal (Russett, Starr and Kinsella, 2009). First section of Immanuel Kant’s writings emphasized that no peace-treaty will be valid if it is made with a secret reservation for material for a future war, an independently existing land shall not be acquired by another state for inheritance, standing armies shall gradually be abolished, a state’s debts shall not be contracted in connection with the external affairs of the state etc. The other sections from his writings suggested that each nation can demand of the others that th ey should enter along with them in to a constitution, similar to the civil one for the sake of security reasons. His perpetual peace theory denoted idea of international right which in turn presupposes the separate existence of many independent states (Kant, p. 368- 374).

Report style Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 1

Report style - Essay Example As expected, Coke will once again participate in the 2012 Olympics as a Major partner. This is to reiterate their market stance and continue working on maintaining their market position. Every celebration, the Olympics gathers athletes and spectators, old and new alike, from every color and race. The management sees this as a potential to further penetrate new and emerging markets as well as sustaining old ones. There is always something new to look forward to every Olympics celebration, and there will always be new heights to be conquered. A. Strength – Coca Cola’s strength lies mainly on its brand popularity. It can’t be denied that Coke is a well-known brand worldwide, topping the lists of preferred beverages. Showing the brand logo alone triggers recall among the audience, having been a dominant brand in the market for over a century already. B. Weakness – Negative Publicities being released against the brand prove to be Coke’s weakness. Through the years, carbonated drinks have been associated to health concerns, and this contributes to the brand/ product’s weaknesses. C. Opportunity – Despite’s Coke’s stature as the best selling soft drink internationally, there is still an opportunity to introduce a new product positioning particularly in global celebrations such as the Olympics. As a consumer product, there is always more room to grow and more market to saturate. This brand may emerge as the preferred thirst quencher during the event, resulting to greater brand loyalty and repeat consumption even after the event ends. D. Threat – The emergence of health drinks such as cold teas and non-carbonated drinks has definitely affected the sales of cola drinks. People are now becoming health conscious, with grocery shelves being filled with Health Beverages. This proves as a threat especially now that these beverages are being sold in retail and competes with Coca Cola pricing. Sometimes, these brands even emerge

Gerontology clinician Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Gerontology clinician - Essay Example Gerontologists study how older people are treated within a society and how elderly deal with the inevitable problems of aging, particularly those involving health and income. Health problems include normal losses in hearing, eyesight, and memory, and the increased likelihood of the incidence of chronic disease. These losses are gradual and proceed at different rates for each individual. In general, the health of older people today is superior to that of previous generations- a condition that is likely to improve still further as more people receive better medical care throughout their lives. In most industrial societies, the high cost of treating chronic illness has been assumed, at least partially, by national health insurance schemes. The second major problem of the elderly involves income and economic welfare. Because most old people no longer form part of the labour force, some form of income maintenance is necessary. Industrial societies generally employ systems of pensions and social security benefits partly for this purpose. In spite of this fact, however, many elderly people live below, on, or only slightly above the poverty level; these are predominantly women and members of ethnic and other minority groups for whom economic security has always been insecure. (Le Shan, 1986) The third factor is that the vast majorities of elderly men are married and live with their wives in homes of their own. In the west generally, many widowed women are able to maintain an independent one- person household. Thus, fewer than about 20 percent of the elderly live in the household of an adult child, and around only around 5 percent are in institutions such as hospitals or nursing homes. Those who live with an adult child or who are institutionalized are typically very old or have serious health problems. Although both the elderly and their children express a strong preference for independent residence, most old people live within a few hours' travel of one of their children. The fourth factor is that the Social relationships might be difficult to maintain in old age because of health limitations, the death of family members and friends, loss of workmates, and lack of suitable affordable transport. Still, many old people invest as much time and energy as possible in friendships and family, and find companionship at special centers and day clubs for senior citizens. Historically, in the past particularly, old people commanded respect, as; indeed they still do in countries such as China and Japan, and the fate of other family members. In most modern societies, however, young people are independent; they themselves choose whom they will marry, and receive public education.(Rashkis, Harold A, 1981). Elderly people themselves, however, often display high levels of morale, satisfaction with life, and feeling of self-worth, even though recently there have been increasing instances of neglect and ill-treatment of elderly people. The important variables in this are, of course, health and income. The responsibility of modern societies in this respect is to ensure that the aged have their basic needs met and that they have the resources to continue to function usefully and happily within the community. (Butler, Robert, 1975). Ageing in biology, combination of changes in an organism that appear to occur inevitably and irreversibly with the passage of time, eventually resulting in death. Among humans they include a decrease in tissue flexibility, loss of some

ndividual Assignment Ethics Reflection Paper Essay Example for Free

ndividual Assignment Ethics Reflection Paper Essay Business Ethics and Social Responsibility Resources: Ethics Awareness Inventory and Ethical Choices in the Workplace assessments Use the Ethics Awareness Inventory and Ethical Choices in the Workplace assessments to revisityour personal and professional values. Write a paper of no more than 1,050-words in which you do the following: †¢ Explain the role of ethics and social responsibility in developing a strategic plan,considering stakeholder needs. †¢ Explain how your ethical perspective has evolved throughout the program. Format your paper according to APA standards. General Questions General General Questions Take the Ethics Awareness Inventory and Ethical Choices in the Workplace assessments to assess your values. Write a paper between 600 to 700 words in which you do the following: Explain the role of ethics and social responsibility in developing a strategic plan, considering stakeholder needs. Explain how your ethical perspective has evolved throughout the program. Format your paper consistent with APA guidelines. Click the Assignment Files tab to submit your assignment. If you cant settle on a major in your first year, then take a couple core classes for any major you are considering. Youll learn about each field thoroughly this way. When you are ready to choose, youll have the credits you need for that major, plus the minors as well. This file of STR 581 Week 1 Individual Assignment Ethics Reflection Paper comprises: Business Ethics and Social Responsibility Resources: Ethics Awareness Inventory and Ethical Choices in the Workplace assessments Use the Ethics Awareness Inventory and Ethical Choices in the Workplace a Follow the link to get tutorial https://bitly.com/1wyRSFq If you cant settle on a major in your first year, then take a couple core classes for any major you are considering. Youll learn about each field thoroughly this way. When you are ready to choose, youll have the credits you need for that major, plus the minors as well. General Questions General General Questions Take the Ethics Awareness Inventory and Ethical Choices in the Workplace assessments to assess your values. Write a paper between 600 to 700 words in which you do the following: Explain the role of ethics and social responsibility in developing a strategic plan, considering stakeholder needs. Explain how your ethical perspective has evolved throughout the program. Format your paper consistent with APA guidelines. Click the Assignment Files tab to submit your assignment.

Data collection and procedure Essay Example for Free

Data collection and procedure Essay You need to talk about the geographic location and the population of these schools. If you can send me the info, I will write it in. To examine academic achievement, student scores on the social studies portion of the GHSGT will be examined. To examine discipline and attendance, the teachers, administrators and some students will be randomly selected. To examine the difference between block and traditional scheduling, surveys and interview questionnaires will be administered to a randomly selected sample of students fitting the above criteria. Questions will be designed to illicit responses as to the advantages of block schedule and will be based upon the broad questions that follow: Research Question #1 – Has the implementation of block scheduling caused an increase in test scores of students in their final year of high school? Research Question #2 – Has the implementation of block scheduling reduced the number of student absences? Research Questions #3 – Has the implementation of block scheduling reduced the number of discipline issues (detentions, suspensions and expulsions) of the students? The surveys and questionnaires will be delivered to the two schools administered in the method that the principal allows. The administrator or his designee will collect the surveys and questionnaires after completion. Each participant of this study will be informed prior to his participation that he is doing so voluntarily. Each participant will have the opportunity to review and sign an informed consent form prior to participating in the study. Some participants may choose to not be involved in this study. To encourage honesty in the responses, the confidentiality of each participant will be guaranteed. A portion of the informed consent statement attests to this confidentiality. No names, only codes will be used on the survey’s themselves with the code’s keys kept in a secure location. Data Analysis and Interpretation Plan All surveys will be compiles into percentages. These percentages will be analyzed for trends among schools with and without block schedules. Data will be charted and graphed where appropriate. Correlations will be drawn based on findings. A discussion and analysis of each subcomponent will be presented. Implications One of the biggest implications in undertaking this type of scheduling change is cost. The block schedule requires additional teachers (usually four or five) for the same number of students. These teachers also need a place to teach, which either requires the building of additional space, the addition of modular classrooms, or the need for teachers to share classrooms (Dobbs, W. , 1997). Another major implication for teachers is the need for changing teaching methods. Extended blocks allow teachers to experiment with new and creative strategies that will appeal to a variety of learning styles. They are able to incorporate more technology and remediation or enrichment exercises as needed. Unfortunately, despite these opportunities, many teachers are hesitant, even fearful, of the block scheduling concept. Researchers Hackmann and Schmitt (1997) warn that: These large blocks may be viewed with a great deal of apprehension by veteran teachers. A typical reaction may be What am I going to do for that many minutes? Even though a new scheduling configuration may have unanimous faculty support as the thing to do, teachers still must confront the daily reality of preparing creative, enriching lessons that keep students engaged academically. It seems a large part of the success for block scheduling lies in the hands of the school districts for providing adequate funding and in the administration and teachers for lending it their willingness and support (Dobbs, W. , 1998). The following is a suggested list of criteria that change agents might want to consider: Utilization of effective research and practice. Inclusion of appropriate assessment plan and tools. Collaboration within the school community of administration, staff, and peers as appropriate. Compliance with federal, state, and local laws, regulatory agency rules, board policies and regulations, and negotiated employee agreements. Assurance of a reasonable level of awareness and support within the school district community, including the Board of Education and others with an interest in the decision. Analysis of fiscal impact. (The Change Process and Alternative Scheduling, 1996). Finally, the utilization of block scheduling may be a determining factor in the legislated school choice options of parents in Georgia. The A+ Education Reform Act was passed by the Georgia General Assembly and signed into law by Governor Barnes in 2000. Its purpose was to significantly alter the management of education in Georgia. School performance, student achievement, and the efficient utilization of resources were its chief concerns and stakeholders at all levels were involved in this process and accountable for its results. Parents may request student transfers for achievement or overcrowding reasons (HB1187, 2000). Scheduling decisions may certainly affect the rights of parents to exercise this choice. Summary In order to become completely informed as to the effects of block scheduling on academic performance, more studies will have to be conducted. Walker, (2000), recommends the following areas of study be conducted: Longitudinal studies of climate issues over extended periods of time are needed.   Studies of student behavior over extended periods of time in multiple schools are recommended Studies of individual subject areas should be expanded. More study is necessary concerning the effectiveness of two-day versus four or five-day block-schedules †¢ Studies should be conducted to determine the effects of block scheduling on teaching behavior. †¢ Finally, the area of greatest need is the study of individual student’s achievement over extended periods of time. Rarely does a problem as large as education have one simple solution. Oftentimes, solutions emerge over time and in conjunction with many other variables. Such is the case with block scheduling. In its short tenure, few studies are conclusive with regard to its test scores. However, with the examination of different variables, some insight into the situation may be helpful. Education is constantly evolving; one thing is for certain – everyone must be willing to change with it for the good of each generation of students. CHAPTER FOUR REFERENCES Aratani, L. (2006, July 13). Upper Grades, Lower Reading Skills: Middle, High Schools Find They Must Expand Programs for Older Students. The Washington Post, p. B01 Canady, R. L. , and Rettig, M. D. (1995). Block Scheduling: A Catalyst for Change in High Schools Princeton, N. J. : Eye on Education, Inc. Canady, R. L. , and Rettig, M. D. (2003, October). Block schedulings missteps, successes and variables: a study finds steady progress in the use of alternatives to the traditional schedule. School Administrator. Retrieved 23 July 2006 from: http://www. findarticles. com/p/articles/mi_m0JSD/is_9_60/ai_108837464/print Carroll, J. M. (1995). The Copernican Plan evaluated: The Evolution of a Revolution. Phi Delta. Kappa 76, pp. 104-110, 112-113. The Change Process and Alternative Scheduling. (1996). Educational Issues Series. Wisconsin Education Association Council. Retrieved 22 July 2006 from: http://www. weac. org/ resource/june96/schedule. htm Dobbs, M. (2004, December 7). In a Global Test of Math Skills, U. S. Students Behind the Curve. The Washington Post, p. A01 Dobbs, W. (1998). The Block Schedule. Intel Innovation in Education. Retrieved 20 July 2006 from: http://www. intel. com/education/projects/wildride/supporting/BlkSched. htm Domaleski, C. (2004, Fall). An Examination of Block Scheduling Practices and End of Coursec Achievement. Journal of Instructional Psychology. Retrieved 20 July 2006 from: http://www. findarticles. com/p/ articles/mi_m0FCG/is_3_27/ai_66355137/pg_3 Leckrone, M. Griffith, B. (2006). Retention realities and educational standards. Children and Schools 28 (1), 55-58. Lewis, C. W. , Dugan, J. J. , Winokur, M. A. , and Cobb, R. B. (2005, December). The Effects of Block Scheduling on High School Academic Achievement. The National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP) Bulletin 89 (645) Magdol, L. (1992). Factors for Adolescent Academic Achievement. Youth Futures Project. University of Wisconsin-Madison, July National Commission on Excellence in Education. (2004). A Nation Still at risk: The Imperative for educational reform. Washington, D. C. : U. S. Department of Education. National Education Commission on Time and Learning. (1994). Prisoners of Time. Washington, D. C. : U. S. Government Printing Office. No Child Left Behind Act. (2001). 2001, Pub. L. No 107-110. Retrieved January 17, 2005, from http://www. ed. gov/nclb North Carolina Department of Public Instruction. (1997). Block Scheduled High School Achievement Part II: Comparison of End-of-Course Test Scores for Blocked and Nonblocked High Schools (1993 through 1996).

Benefits of Leisure on the Individual

Benefits of Leisure on the Individual Introduction / Summary In previous contributions, there should have been wide discussions to draw the limits of leisure. I would like to get assistance one that you have read those chapters, in order to write some introductory paragraph that lets the reader know if my contribution is particularly related to some other one. In this contribution, I will analyze it by using the subjective well-being approach. I will use the leisure experience dimension (as described bellow), and I will study the determinants of subjective well-being. There will be plenty of conceptual discussion, some regularities will be reported, an empirical exercise will be performed results analyzed, and some insights for future research will be presented. In this paper, we will study leisure and its beneficial aspects over individual welfare by using a quite new approach: the subjective well-being or happiness approach to measure individual welfare. Along the discussion, we will present two main points. First, we will discuss on the dimensions of leisure in order to justify that by using subjective well-being procedures, we can get a comprehensive approximation to the, somehow difficult to measure, leisure concept. Second, to determine which are the personal and environmental factors that are needed so an individual can produce and consume enjoyable leisure experiences. In this chapter, we are not going to consider that leisure is just free time, i.e. time that is not dedicated to market work, nor to household maintenance activities. We are not even going to consider that leisure is discretionary time (Goodin, et al. 2005). What we state is that leisure is a universal human need that has to be fulfilled by the production in the household and the personal consumption of what we may call leisure experiences. Each experience is a commodity that enters directly in the individuals utility function. This means that leisure is one of the arguments of the utility function of the individual, one of the instances from which she will get welfare. By doing this, we will adopt from the beginning a beckerian approach (Becker, 1965, and 1990). Other arguments are (Gronau and Hamermesh, 2006). From that list of commodities, we can agree that leisure is the most time intensive one. Individuals have this particular basic need, leisure, to be fulfilled using the most suitable combination of personal resources. As always, we are living in a scarce world where every input has some alternative use, so people have to make allocation choices about the best way to fulfill this leisure need as well as others such as food, shelter, and so on. However, we will introduce into our analysis a basic feature of leisure: the presence of enjoyable others. Only recently has this aspect been introduced in the economic analysis of leisure (Osberg, 2009). In this paper, we address the question of how personal inputs are optimally combined to satisfy the leisure need in a social context. By means the analysis of the leisure domain satisfaction, we will be able to asses how personal free time transforms into leisure and how this outcome contributes to individual welfare. Each person would define the boundaries of leisure on the basis of her tastes, on different resource availability to fulfill her needs, and may value the final outcome in many different ways depending on the social norms, her personal aspirations, social interactions and past experiences. Since using a personal definition of leisure would make any analysis impossible, we will present the main three different constructions of leisure, as proposed by Kelly (1982). The first approach of leisure is the most basic one that defines leisure as quantifiable leisure time, either residual or discretional, based on the freedom to choose. The second one defines leisure as the activity that is chosen at a given time and place so that it is the quality of the activity which defines it as leisure. The third one defines leisure as a subjective condition on the grounds of a freely chosen experience based on intrinsic motivation. The integrative approach proposed by Kelly is the one that we follow in this research, where Leisure is an action that takes place at a given time, develops an identifiable activity and is perceived as a pleasant experience by the actor. In what follows, we would refer to this last integrative approach either as leisure or leisure experience. Actually, it fits very well with the following definition of leisure satisfaction by Beard and Ragheb (1980). For them, leisure satisfaction is the positive perceptions or feelings that an individual forms, elicits, or gains as a result of engaging in leisure activities and choices. It is the degree to which one is presently content or pleased with her general leisure experiences and situations. This positive feeling of pleasure results from the satisfaction of felt or unfelt needs of the individual. Traditional economic theory studies human behavior by means of individual’s observed choices. In such a spirit, observed time allocation can be an outcome of interest recorded on time-use surveys. Actually, as we will discuss in the concluding section, time-use registers are a very valuable source of information, and many of the questions that we are going to address could be complementarily studied by testing those hypotheses with that type of data. However, even if some authors consider that time is the ultimate source of utility, time by itself provides no utility to individuals, since the mere passing of time does not fulfill any human need (possibly except from sleeping time). Moreover, since we have no means of observing the final leisure output, we have to rely on the subjective assessment of how satisfied people feel with the leisure that they enjoy. At the end of the day, the main challenge is to determine how an unobservable, such as leisure, can contribute to individual welfare. In this case, we are considering a double black-box. First, not everyone defines leisure in the same way and not everyone produces leisure experiences by using the same technology or the same inputs. For some people, the presence of others will be much more needed that for some other people. Some people could be much more materialistic than others. Some people could be much more efficient in the production of pleasurable experiences because of their higher education. Second, as indicated before, we know that leisure contributed to enhance the quality of life of people, but the valuation of those experiences is determined by societal norms and arrangements and by personal aspirations, past experiences and comparison effects. Next section will present the happiness or subjective well-being approach. We will introduce a brief discussion of the rationale for using this approach for economic research and for leisure research. To do so, we will present the domain approach; in this setting, leisure satisfaction will be considered a mediator between individual leisure experience and overall satisfaction or happiness. In section 3, we will discuss the relationship between leisure time and well-being. Other crucial aspects will be discussed in section 4, where we review a series of social and economic factors that are said to influence leisure enjoyment, so leisure has a high quality and contributes to a better quality of life. Particularly, we will report previous findings on the social dimension of leisure, one of the attributes that determine high quality leisure experiences. In that same section, some determinants of overall satisfaction, or of particular domain satisfaction will be discussed. Last, sections 5 and 6 will present, respectively, some conclusions and a brief overview of needed research to better understand the contribution of leisure to a better quality of life. Subjective well-being approach Traditional research on quality of life relied heavily on objective and materialistic indicators of living conditions. Actually, Gross Domestic Product has been the â€Å"champion† indicator when studying the evolution of living standards and when comparing economies (Mankiw, 2007). Under the realm of objective indicators, nearly all non market activities and many aspects of human development, such as leisure, are neglected. New studies have highlighted the superiority of including the subjective approach to the investigation of quality of life in developed and developing societies, and happiness research has become quite of a fashionable and popular topic (Layard, 2006). There is a growing interest on using the subjective well-being approach to analyze living conditions and there has been an emerging literature on social sciences. Among other reasons for that flourishing, we can highlight the following: (i) this approach offers richer insight about the quality of life, and considers other indicators of development apart from the traditional indicators; (ii) nowadays there is more information available about living conditions, opinions and perceptions of people and societies, and; (iii) with this approach it is possible to identify the major needs and problems of the population, which is useful for governments and policy makers (Frey and Stutzer, JEL 2002). Economists and other social scientists broadly define `happiness and `life satisfaction as subjective well-being. Following Diener and Seligman (2004, pp. 4) life satisfaction is defined as a global judgment of well-being based on information the person believes is relevant, while well-being includes all of the evaluations, both cognitive and affective, that people make of their lives and components of their lives. While according to some authors, the terms happiness, subjective wellbeing, well-being, satisfaction and quality of life are somewhat different and each have their own specific meaning, responses in different surveys are highly correlated (Fordyce, 1988; Frey and Stutzer, 2002b), and many analyses use them indiscriminately. In this current study these terms are used with the understanding that they have a similar connotation. The present study will use a bottom-up approach to the analysis of subjective well-being. This approach considers that overall life satisfaction is determined by what is called domain satisfaction; the evaluation of own personal situation on different dimensions of life such as: financial situation, housing conditions, health, leisure, job or education, among other dimensions. Some authors signal the mediator role of those domain satisfactions to determine overall happiness (Cummins, 1996; van Praag et al., 2003; Easterlin and Sawangfa, 2007). In what follows, we will consider that leisure satisfaction has leisure experiences as the main input; higher leisure satisfaction will contribute, in turn, to higher overall satisfaction or happiness. In order to assess the size of different influences upon happiness and satisfaction with life in general, psychologists have been using surveys since long ago, while only recently economists have recognized that there is useful information in a subjective well-being answer as an empirical approximation for the theoretical concept of utility. With the exception of the seminal work of Easterlin (1974), most research has taken place during the last two decades. The existing state of research suggests that, for many purposes, happiness or reported subjective well-being is a satisfactory empirical proxy of individual utility. From the information about the determinants of individual happiness, different situations of economic and social policies inside a country or a region can be analyzed . Frey and Stutzer (2002b) give some important reasons for economists to consider happiness research. First, happiness research can help to evaluate net effects, in terms of individual utilities, for different economic policies. Understanding the determinants of subjective well-being can thus usefully inform economic policy decisions. Second, this research also has relevance to economists because of the effect of institutional conditions such as the quality of governance and the size of social capital on individual well-being. It may also help to solve empirical puzzles that conventional economic theories find difficult to explain. For instance, using this approach it is possible to understand why for several countries since World War ll although they have raised their real income drastically, the self-reported subjective well-being of the population has not increased or has even slightly fallen. Data about happiness are collected through direct questioning via interviews or self-administered questionnaires in which individuals self-rate their happiness on a single item or on a multi-item scale. These scales offer a list of options, which are ranked according to the levels of happiness . Most studies of subjective well-being are based on some variation on the question How satisfied (or happy) are you with your life? The range of possible responses is defined over a scale that varies between datasets (one to four, one to seven, or one to ten), the lowest grades indicating a poor level of life satisfaction. The main use of happiness measures is not to compare levels in an absolute sense but rather to seek to identify the determinants of happiness. The strategy is to use the answers that people give when asked questions about how happy they feel with life. Similar questions are posed with respect to job satisfaction, health satisfaction, housing satisfaction, satisfaction with marital relation, etc. †¦, and leisure satisfaction or satisfaction with leisure time. This study of the different aspects of life is called domain satisfaction. Although this approach could have limitations, as was said by Oswald (1997, p. 1816) if the aim is to learn about what makes people tick, listening to what they say seems likely to be a natural first step. The domains-of-life literature states that life can be approached as a general construct of many specific domains, and that life satisfaction can be understood as a result from satisfaction in these domains of life (Cummins, 1996; van Praag et.al, 2003; Easterlin and Sawangfa, 2007; Rojas, 2006a, 2006b). It is evident that different domains may be distinguished. In many studies, the domains to be analyzed are determined by data availability. For instance, in the British Household Panel Survey leisure satisfaction is split up into two sub-dimensions; namely, the amount of leisure and use of the leisure time (Van Praag and Ferrer-i-Carbonell, 2007); the European Community Household Panel considers only satisfaction with leisure time , and the Latinobarà ³metro only includes satisfaction with the amount of leisure (Rojas, XXXX). Rojas (2007) affirms that the enumeration and demarcation of the domains of life are arbitrary. In addition to this, there are many possible partitions of a human life, and the selected partition depends on the researchs objectives and the available information. For example, Cummins (1996) has argued for a seven-domain partition: material well-being, health, productivity intimacy, safety, community and emotional well-being; van Praag et al. (2003) study the relationship of satisfaction in different domains of life (health, financial situation, job, housing, leisure and environment) and satisfaction with life as a whole. Rojas (2006b and 2007), on the basis of factor analysis, identified seven domains of life: health, economic, job, family, friendship, personal and community. Using information from Mexico , he showed that satisfaction in the family domain is crucial for life satisfaction. Family satisfaction includes aspects of satisfaction with ones spouse, children and with the rest of the family. Rojas also showed that the satisfaction in the health, job and personal domains is also very important for a persons happiness. Satisfaction in areas such as housing and living conditions, financial solvency and income are relatively less important for life satisfaction. Rojas (2007) found that income is an explanatory variable of relevancy for economic and labor satisfaction, but not for family satisfaction or leisure satisfaction. For that reason, it is possible to find situations where a person is satisfied with his/her life while he/she is unsatisfied economically, or where a person is unsatisfied wit h his/her life and, at the same time, his/her economic satisfaction is high (Rojas, 2008b). Empirical research has focused on different factors associated with subjective well-being and satisfaction. In agreement with psychological and sociological studies (Argyle, 1999), economic research has identified a set of personal and social characteristics associated with life satisfaction. Most studies using data from North America and European countries have found the level of reported life satisfaction to be high among those who are married (Blanchflower and Oswald, 2004b; Easterlin, 2003; Carroll, 2007; Clark et al., 2005; Ferrer-i-Carbonell and Frijters, 2004), women (Oswald, 1997; Clark, 1997), whites (Oswald, 1997; Alesina et al., 2004), the well-educated (Blanchflower and Oswald, 2004a; Frey and Stutzer, 2003; Borooah, 2005), the self-employed (Blanchflower, 2000; Blanchflower, 2004; Frey and Benz, 2003; Alesina et al., 2004), the retired (Di Tella et al., 2003), and those occupied with home duties (Di Tella et al., 2003; Borooah, 2005). The relation between an individuals age and happiness seems to be a bit more complex. Many people believe that the quality of life deteriorates with age and that old people should be unhappier than young people since the old tend to have a worse health, less income, and few are married. Nevertheless, many studies have surprisingly thought that old people report levels of happiness comparatively higher than young people, though this effect tends to be small. Frey and Stutzer (2001) have indicated four reasons that can explain this positive relationship between age and happiness: (i) the old have lower expectations and aspirations. For example, an elderly person waits to remain without work and possibly widower, so the effects of the loss will be lower on the old than on the young. (ii) They have little disparity between goals and achievements, since the eldelrlys goals are fixed closer to what reasonably they can reach. (iii) Older individuals have had more time to adjust to their life conditions, and (iv) old people have learned how to reduce the negative events of the life and how to regulate the negative affects. Besides, economists have identified a U-shape in the relationship between age and happiness (e.g. Oswald, 1997; Blanchflower and Oswald, 2004a). This implies a convex shape in the relationship of life satisfaction with age. Life satisfaction decreases with age until it reaches a minimum, increasing afterwards. For North America and European countries this minimum typically occurs in the forties (43 in Frey and Stutzer (2001) and Ferrer-i-Carbonell (2005); 46 in Peiro (2007)). Aspirations and comparisons effects also are important in relation with income and other factors affecting subjective well-being. The individuals reported subjective well-being in the present is based on a norm of what is `bad, `sufficient or `good. Such norms not only depend on the present situation, but also on what the individual has experienced in the past, on what he/she expects to experience in the future and on what other people think and do (van Praag and Ferrer-i-Carbonell, 2004). In relation with income, individual well-being does not only depend on income in absolute terms but also on the subjective perception of whether ones income is adequate to satisfy ones needs. In addition, individual income perception is subject to the individuals own situation, past and present, as well as to the income of other people. The latter reflects the importance of the relative position of individuals in society for their satisfaction with life. This is often referred to as the comparison income or relative utility effect. It is often argued that individuals adapt to new situations by changing their expectations (Easterlin, 2005; Clark et al., 2008). This implies that higher incomes are accompanied by rising expectations that lead to what is known as the hedonic treadmill (Brickman and Campbell, 1971) or hedonic adaptation (Frederick and Loewenstein, 1999). Thus, individuals strive for high incomes even if these lead only to a temporary or small increase in well-being. This ability to adapt would appear to be a ubiquitous feature of the human condition, some recent examples of adaptation in nonmonetary spheres are Lucas et al. (2003) and Lucas (2005) with respect to marriage and divorce, Wu (2001) and Oswald and Powdthavee (2006) for adaptation to illness or disability, and Lucas et al. (2004) regarding unemployment. The comparisons with different social reference groups are also an important factor that has been widely present in the analysis of two dimensions; namely, the analysis of the effect of relative income on financial satisfaction and/or satisfaction with life as a whole (McBride, 2001; Stutzer, 2004; Luttmer, 2005; Clark, Frijters and Shields, 2008) and the influence of unemployment on subjective well-being. A standard result in happiness literature is that the unemployed report significantly lower levels of subjective well-being than other labor force groups (Winkelman and Winkelman, 1998; Frey and Stutzer, 2002). Indeed, the pecuniary and the non-pecuniary costs of the unemployment are that high that adaptation is non-existent (Lucas et al., 2004) or only very moderate (Clark, 2002). Clark (2003) uses seven waves of the British Household Panel Survey to test for social norms in labor market status. In his analysis, he found that the well-being of the unemployed is the higher, the hig her the unemployment rate in a reference group (at the regional, partner, or household level). It seems that, the more unemployment becomes the norm, the less individuals are affected by it (Winkelman, 2006). Lalive and Stutzer (2004), using a different strategy, obtain the same results for information from Sweden. Social interactions could be either a negative or a positive factor. As previously mentioned, an individuals happiness depends on that individuals own relative (or positional) situation or status, and comparison with others, what would expose that individual to negative externalities in terms of peer-effects (Luttmer, 2005) in utility and/or consumption. Alpizar, Carlsson and Johansson-Stenman (2005) show that positionality matters far more for commodities as houses and cars than for vacation and insurance, but also that both absolute and relative consumption matter for each category, these are positional goods. The positive influence of social interactions may come from social relationships and other relational goods or social capital factors. For instance, Rojas (2007), Winkelman (2006), Argyle (1999), among other social scientists have found that social relationships are a major source of well-being. Although marriage is the relationship that has the most influence on happiness, there are other relationships that affect happiness, as well as health and mental health, by providing social support. Argyle (1999 p. 361) refers some studies where it was found that if all kinds of social support are combined, a social support factor is found to have a strong correlation of 0.50 with happiness. Social scientists in many countries have observed that social support or social networks (and the associated norms of reciprocity and trust (Helliwell and Putnam, 2004)) have powerful effects on the level and efficiency of production and well-being, broadly defined, and they have used the term social capital to refer to these effects (Coleman, 1988; Putnam, 2000; Woolcock and Narayan, 2000). Lately, some cross-sectional studies from both sociology and economics have shown the importance of key aspects of social capital such as trust, social contacts and membership in voluntary associations over individual well-being (Inglehart 1999; Putnam 2000; Helliwell 2003 and 2006b; Powdthavee, 2008). In Bowling Alone, Putnam (2000) suggested that people prosper in neighborhoods and societies where social capital is high, that is, where people trust one another and are mutually helpful. Putnam reviewed evidence showing that communities with high rates of volunteer activity, club membership, church membership, and social entertaining (all thought to be indirect manifestations of social capital) all had higher well-being than communities that were impoverish these characteristics. Many studies that use cross-sectional data have shown that individuals with rich networks of active social relationships, that do not include people living in the same household, tend to be happier with th eir lives (Phillips 1967; Burt 1987). Helliwell (2003) reported that well-being is high and suicide rates are low where trust in others is high, and he also found that well-being is high where memberships in organizations outside of work are at high levels. Thus, there is evidence that individuals are more likely to experience high well-being when they live in nations with high social capital than when they live in nations with low social capital, a finding that dovetails with the results of studies on individuals social interactions. Helliwell and Putnam (2004) and Powdthavee (2008) are comprehensive reviews about the importance of social capital factor over subjective well-being. Health status is a factor that can be expected to be an important determinant of life satisfaction. In the 1950s the use of concepts such as welfare, adjustment and mental health had much in common with the traditional concept about happiness (Argyle, 1991). Research on the health-related quality of life was developed in the mid 1970s by health scientists and psychologists in order to track peoples perception of their health status (Gough et al., 2007). This was mainly in response to the need for more sensitive measures to compare treatments for chronic illness and to identify the most cost-effective treatments . Good health is considered an important factor included in the capabilities and the necessary functionalities in order for an individual to face life (Deaton, 2007; Sen, 1999). Since the 1980s the state of health has been identified as an important determinant of life satisfaction, as happy people are healthier, both physically and mentally (Veenhoven, 1991; Argyle, 1999). Co nsequently, poor health, which limits an individuals ability to carry out their daily activities, reduces overall satisfaction. The literature about subjective well-being in Latin American countries is few and very recent. Graham and Pettinato (2001) were some of the first to analyze Latin American countries. Using the Latinobarà ³metro 2000, they found that Latin America is not all that different from the advanced industrial economies in relation to some of the determinants of happiness. Similar to the OECD countries, happiness has a quadratic relationship with age, initially decreasing and then increasing monotonically after 49 years of age. As in the industrial countries, being married had positive and significant effects. In contrast to the advanced economies, a significant gender effect was no found in Latin America. Also, as in the industrial countries, the coefficients for level of wealth were strong, positive, and significant in happiness. When wealth was included in the regressions, the coefficient for education level became insignificant or weakly significant, depending on the regression used. Bein g self-employed or unemployed both had significant and negative effects on happiness. When they included country-fixed effects, the coefficient on self-employment became insignificant. While being unemployed also has negative effects on happiness in the advanced industrial economies, being self-employed has positive effects. The most credible explanation is intuitive and it was given by the authors: most self-employed people in the latter are self-employed by choice, while in developing economies, many are self-employed due to the absence of more secure employment opportunities and live a precarious existence in the informal sector. Other analyses by countries have been conducted in Latin America. Among the most important, Rojas (2006b and 2007), using the domains-of-life approach in Mexico, found that people are on average, more satisfied in the family domain, while they are less satisfied in the consumption, personal and job domains. Rojas (2007) found that income is an explanatory variable of relevancy for the economic and labor satisfaction, but not for either family or leisure satisfaction. Due to that, he found a weak relationship between income and life satisfaction Gerstenbluth et al. (2007) studied the relationship between happiness and health in Argentina and Uruguay using the Latinobarà ³metro 2004. Cruz and Torres (2006), using the Encuesta de Calidad de Vida 2003, tested various happiness hypotheses among Colombians and Cid et al. (2008), using the survey called Salud, Bienestar y Envejecimiento en Amà ©rica Latina y el Caribe (SABE), explored the correlation between happiness and income in the el derly in Uruguay. To our knowledge, the previous studies conducted about Latin America have not included the effect of social capital on subjective well-being, and they have analyzed the self-employment as a homogeneous labor market status. However, when considering the specificity of the leisure domain, we should take into account that while satisfaction with other realms of life may lie upon the valuation of objective situations (such as one’s financial situation, health or housing conditions), satisfaction with leisure brings in an additional challenge as individual’s boundaries of leisure are defined by her perception of what is pleasant (Ateca-Amestoy et al., 2008). Conceptual discussion on the nature of leisure time in contemporary societies Time allocation decisions within the family: economic approaches and models. We will attach to the economic approach to human behavior by Becker (moreover, bring arguments such as those contained in a theory of social interactions). Temporal autonomy is a matter of having discretionary control over your time. Discretionary Time. A New Measure of Freedom (Goodin et al., 2005) Other approaches: we have found these relevant arguments: Veblens theory The omnivore Bourdieus distinction Putnams social capital 3.1. What is Social Capital? There is a traditional consensus that there exists three distincs traditions that conceptualize and analyze social capital. All three would be relevant for our reasoning. Pierre Bourdieu bourdieu2: who conceptualised social capital as the `actual or potential resources that an individual has at his/her disposal as a result of `a durable network of more or less institutionalised relationships of mutual acquaintance and recognition, i.e. membership in a group. Some authors point out that this definition must be viewed as part of his broader concern with developing the different types of capital in order to explain the means by which the social stratification system is preserved and the dominant class-reproduction strategy is legitimised. J.S. Coleman coleman defines it as the set of resources that inhere in family relations and in community social organisations and that are useful for the cognitive or social development of a child or young person. Social relations were viewed by Coleman to make up important `capital resources for individuals by means of processes such as setting `obligations, expectations and trustworthiness, creating channels for information, and setting norms backed by efficient sanctions. These resources may be influenced by factors such as generalised trustworthiness which ensures that obligations are met, the extent to which a person is in Benefits of Leisure on the Individual Benefits of Leisure on the Individual Introduction / Summary In previous contributions, there should have been wide discussions to draw the limits of leisure. I would like to get assistance one that you have read those chapters, in order to write some introductory paragraph that lets the reader know if my contribution is particularly related to some other one. In this contribution, I will analyze it by using the subjective well-being approach. I will use the leisure experience dimension (as described bellow), and I will study the determinants of subjective well-being. There will be plenty of conceptual discussion, some regularities will be reported, an empirical exercise will be performed results analyzed, and some insights for future research will be presented. In this paper, we will study leisure and its beneficial aspects over individual welfare by using a quite new approach: the subjective well-being or happiness approach to measure individual welfare. Along the discussion, we will present two main points. First, we will discuss on the dimensions of leisure in order to justify that by using subjective well-being procedures, we can get a comprehensive approximation to the, somehow difficult to measure, leisure concept. Second, to determine which are the personal and environmental factors that are needed so an individual can produce and consume enjoyable leisure experiences. In this chapter, we are not going to consider that leisure is just free time, i.e. time that is not dedicated to market work, nor to household maintenance activities. We are not even going to consider that leisure is discretionary time (Goodin, et al. 2005). What we state is that leisure is a universal human need that has to be fulfilled by the production in the household and the personal consumption of what we may call leisure experiences. Each experience is a commodity that enters directly in the individuals utility function. This means that leisure is one of the arguments of the utility function of the individual, one of the instances from which she will get welfare. By doing this, we will adopt from the beginning a beckerian approach (Becker, 1965, and 1990). Other arguments are (Gronau and Hamermesh, 2006). From that list of commodities, we can agree that leisure is the most time intensive one. Individuals have this particular basic need, leisure, to be fulfilled using the most suitable combination of personal resources. As always, we are living in a scarce world where every input has some alternative use, so people have to make allocation choices about the best way to fulfill this leisure need as well as others such as food, shelter, and so on. However, we will introduce into our analysis a basic feature of leisure: the presence of enjoyable others. Only recently has this aspect been introduced in the economic analysis of leisure (Osberg, 2009). In this paper, we address the question of how personal inputs are optimally combined to satisfy the leisure need in a social context. By means the analysis of the leisure domain satisfaction, we will be able to asses how personal free time transforms into leisure and how this outcome contributes to individual welfare. Each person would define the boundaries of leisure on the basis of her tastes, on different resource availability to fulfill her needs, and may value the final outcome in many different ways depending on the social norms, her personal aspirations, social interactions and past experiences. Since using a personal definition of leisure would make any analysis impossible, we will present the main three different constructions of leisure, as proposed by Kelly (1982). The first approach of leisure is the most basic one that defines leisure as quantifiable leisure time, either residual or discretional, based on the freedom to choose. The second one defines leisure as the activity that is chosen at a given time and place so that it is the quality of the activity which defines it as leisure. The third one defines leisure as a subjective condition on the grounds of a freely chosen experience based on intrinsic motivation. The integrative approach proposed by Kelly is the one that we follow in this research, where Leisure is an action that takes place at a given time, develops an identifiable activity and is perceived as a pleasant experience by the actor. In what follows, we would refer to this last integrative approach either as leisure or leisure experience. Actually, it fits very well with the following definition of leisure satisfaction by Beard and Ragheb (1980). For them, leisure satisfaction is the positive perceptions or feelings that an individual forms, elicits, or gains as a result of engaging in leisure activities and choices. It is the degree to which one is presently content or pleased with her general leisure experiences and situations. This positive feeling of pleasure results from the satisfaction of felt or unfelt needs of the individual. Traditional economic theory studies human behavior by means of individual’s observed choices. In such a spirit, observed time allocation can be an outcome of interest recorded on time-use surveys. Actually, as we will discuss in the concluding section, time-use registers are a very valuable source of information, and many of the questions that we are going to address could be complementarily studied by testing those hypotheses with that type of data. However, even if some authors consider that time is the ultimate source of utility, time by itself provides no utility to individuals, since the mere passing of time does not fulfill any human need (possibly except from sleeping time). Moreover, since we have no means of observing the final leisure output, we have to rely on the subjective assessment of how satisfied people feel with the leisure that they enjoy. At the end of the day, the main challenge is to determine how an unobservable, such as leisure, can contribute to individual welfare. In this case, we are considering a double black-box. First, not everyone defines leisure in the same way and not everyone produces leisure experiences by using the same technology or the same inputs. For some people, the presence of others will be much more needed that for some other people. Some people could be much more materialistic than others. Some people could be much more efficient in the production of pleasurable experiences because of their higher education. Second, as indicated before, we know that leisure contributed to enhance the quality of life of people, but the valuation of those experiences is determined by societal norms and arrangements and by personal aspirations, past experiences and comparison effects. Next section will present the happiness or subjective well-being approach. We will introduce a brief discussion of the rationale for using this approach for economic research and for leisure research. To do so, we will present the domain approach; in this setting, leisure satisfaction will be considered a mediator between individual leisure experience and overall satisfaction or happiness. In section 3, we will discuss the relationship between leisure time and well-being. Other crucial aspects will be discussed in section 4, where we review a series of social and economic factors that are said to influence leisure enjoyment, so leisure has a high quality and contributes to a better quality of life. Particularly, we will report previous findings on the social dimension of leisure, one of the attributes that determine high quality leisure experiences. In that same section, some determinants of overall satisfaction, or of particular domain satisfaction will be discussed. Last, sections 5 and 6 will present, respectively, some conclusions and a brief overview of needed research to better understand the contribution of leisure to a better quality of life. Subjective well-being approach Traditional research on quality of life relied heavily on objective and materialistic indicators of living conditions. Actually, Gross Domestic Product has been the â€Å"champion† indicator when studying the evolution of living standards and when comparing economies (Mankiw, 2007). Under the realm of objective indicators, nearly all non market activities and many aspects of human development, such as leisure, are neglected. New studies have highlighted the superiority of including the subjective approach to the investigation of quality of life in developed and developing societies, and happiness research has become quite of a fashionable and popular topic (Layard, 2006). There is a growing interest on using the subjective well-being approach to analyze living conditions and there has been an emerging literature on social sciences. Among other reasons for that flourishing, we can highlight the following: (i) this approach offers richer insight about the quality of life, and considers other indicators of development apart from the traditional indicators; (ii) nowadays there is more information available about living conditions, opinions and perceptions of people and societies, and; (iii) with this approach it is possible to identify the major needs and problems of the population, which is useful for governments and policy makers (Frey and Stutzer, JEL 2002). Economists and other social scientists broadly define `happiness and `life satisfaction as subjective well-being. Following Diener and Seligman (2004, pp. 4) life satisfaction is defined as a global judgment of well-being based on information the person believes is relevant, while well-being includes all of the evaluations, both cognitive and affective, that people make of their lives and components of their lives. While according to some authors, the terms happiness, subjective wellbeing, well-being, satisfaction and quality of life are somewhat different and each have their own specific meaning, responses in different surveys are highly correlated (Fordyce, 1988; Frey and Stutzer, 2002b), and many analyses use them indiscriminately. In this current study these terms are used with the understanding that they have a similar connotation. The present study will use a bottom-up approach to the analysis of subjective well-being. This approach considers that overall life satisfaction is determined by what is called domain satisfaction; the evaluation of own personal situation on different dimensions of life such as: financial situation, housing conditions, health, leisure, job or education, among other dimensions. Some authors signal the mediator role of those domain satisfactions to determine overall happiness (Cummins, 1996; van Praag et al., 2003; Easterlin and Sawangfa, 2007). In what follows, we will consider that leisure satisfaction has leisure experiences as the main input; higher leisure satisfaction will contribute, in turn, to higher overall satisfaction or happiness. In order to assess the size of different influences upon happiness and satisfaction with life in general, psychologists have been using surveys since long ago, while only recently economists have recognized that there is useful information in a subjective well-being answer as an empirical approximation for the theoretical concept of utility. With the exception of the seminal work of Easterlin (1974), most research has taken place during the last two decades. The existing state of research suggests that, for many purposes, happiness or reported subjective well-being is a satisfactory empirical proxy of individual utility. From the information about the determinants of individual happiness, different situations of economic and social policies inside a country or a region can be analyzed . Frey and Stutzer (2002b) give some important reasons for economists to consider happiness research. First, happiness research can help to evaluate net effects, in terms of individual utilities, for different economic policies. Understanding the determinants of subjective well-being can thus usefully inform economic policy decisions. Second, this research also has relevance to economists because of the effect of institutional conditions such as the quality of governance and the size of social capital on individual well-being. It may also help to solve empirical puzzles that conventional economic theories find difficult to explain. For instance, using this approach it is possible to understand why for several countries since World War ll although they have raised their real income drastically, the self-reported subjective well-being of the population has not increased or has even slightly fallen. Data about happiness are collected through direct questioning via interviews or self-administered questionnaires in which individuals self-rate their happiness on a single item or on a multi-item scale. These scales offer a list of options, which are ranked according to the levels of happiness . Most studies of subjective well-being are based on some variation on the question How satisfied (or happy) are you with your life? The range of possible responses is defined over a scale that varies between datasets (one to four, one to seven, or one to ten), the lowest grades indicating a poor level of life satisfaction. The main use of happiness measures is not to compare levels in an absolute sense but rather to seek to identify the determinants of happiness. The strategy is to use the answers that people give when asked questions about how happy they feel with life. Similar questions are posed with respect to job satisfaction, health satisfaction, housing satisfaction, satisfaction with marital relation, etc. †¦, and leisure satisfaction or satisfaction with leisure time. This study of the different aspects of life is called domain satisfaction. Although this approach could have limitations, as was said by Oswald (1997, p. 1816) if the aim is to learn about what makes people tick, listening to what they say seems likely to be a natural first step. The domains-of-life literature states that life can be approached as a general construct of many specific domains, and that life satisfaction can be understood as a result from satisfaction in these domains of life (Cummins, 1996; van Praag et.al, 2003; Easterlin and Sawangfa, 2007; Rojas, 2006a, 2006b). It is evident that different domains may be distinguished. In many studies, the domains to be analyzed are determined by data availability. For instance, in the British Household Panel Survey leisure satisfaction is split up into two sub-dimensions; namely, the amount of leisure and use of the leisure time (Van Praag and Ferrer-i-Carbonell, 2007); the European Community Household Panel considers only satisfaction with leisure time , and the Latinobarà ³metro only includes satisfaction with the amount of leisure (Rojas, XXXX). Rojas (2007) affirms that the enumeration and demarcation of the domains of life are arbitrary. In addition to this, there are many possible partitions of a human life, and the selected partition depends on the researchs objectives and the available information. For example, Cummins (1996) has argued for a seven-domain partition: material well-being, health, productivity intimacy, safety, community and emotional well-being; van Praag et al. (2003) study the relationship of satisfaction in different domains of life (health, financial situation, job, housing, leisure and environment) and satisfaction with life as a whole. Rojas (2006b and 2007), on the basis of factor analysis, identified seven domains of life: health, economic, job, family, friendship, personal and community. Using information from Mexico , he showed that satisfaction in the family domain is crucial for life satisfaction. Family satisfaction includes aspects of satisfaction with ones spouse, children and with the rest of the family. Rojas also showed that the satisfaction in the health, job and personal domains is also very important for a persons happiness. Satisfaction in areas such as housing and living conditions, financial solvency and income are relatively less important for life satisfaction. Rojas (2007) found that income is an explanatory variable of relevancy for economic and labor satisfaction, but not for family satisfaction or leisure satisfaction. For that reason, it is possible to find situations where a person is satisfied with his/her life while he/she is unsatisfied economically, or where a person is unsatisfied wit h his/her life and, at the same time, his/her economic satisfaction is high (Rojas, 2008b). Empirical research has focused on different factors associated with subjective well-being and satisfaction. In agreement with psychological and sociological studies (Argyle, 1999), economic research has identified a set of personal and social characteristics associated with life satisfaction. Most studies using data from North America and European countries have found the level of reported life satisfaction to be high among those who are married (Blanchflower and Oswald, 2004b; Easterlin, 2003; Carroll, 2007; Clark et al., 2005; Ferrer-i-Carbonell and Frijters, 2004), women (Oswald, 1997; Clark, 1997), whites (Oswald, 1997; Alesina et al., 2004), the well-educated (Blanchflower and Oswald, 2004a; Frey and Stutzer, 2003; Borooah, 2005), the self-employed (Blanchflower, 2000; Blanchflower, 2004; Frey and Benz, 2003; Alesina et al., 2004), the retired (Di Tella et al., 2003), and those occupied with home duties (Di Tella et al., 2003; Borooah, 2005). The relation between an individuals age and happiness seems to be a bit more complex. Many people believe that the quality of life deteriorates with age and that old people should be unhappier than young people since the old tend to have a worse health, less income, and few are married. Nevertheless, many studies have surprisingly thought that old people report levels of happiness comparatively higher than young people, though this effect tends to be small. Frey and Stutzer (2001) have indicated four reasons that can explain this positive relationship between age and happiness: (i) the old have lower expectations and aspirations. For example, an elderly person waits to remain without work and possibly widower, so the effects of the loss will be lower on the old than on the young. (ii) They have little disparity between goals and achievements, since the eldelrlys goals are fixed closer to what reasonably they can reach. (iii) Older individuals have had more time to adjust to their life conditions, and (iv) old people have learned how to reduce the negative events of the life and how to regulate the negative affects. Besides, economists have identified a U-shape in the relationship between age and happiness (e.g. Oswald, 1997; Blanchflower and Oswald, 2004a). This implies a convex shape in the relationship of life satisfaction with age. Life satisfaction decreases with age until it reaches a minimum, increasing afterwards. For North America and European countries this minimum typically occurs in the forties (43 in Frey and Stutzer (2001) and Ferrer-i-Carbonell (2005); 46 in Peiro (2007)). Aspirations and comparisons effects also are important in relation with income and other factors affecting subjective well-being. The individuals reported subjective well-being in the present is based on a norm of what is `bad, `sufficient or `good. Such norms not only depend on the present situation, but also on what the individual has experienced in the past, on what he/she expects to experience in the future and on what other people think and do (van Praag and Ferrer-i-Carbonell, 2004). In relation with income, individual well-being does not only depend on income in absolute terms but also on the subjective perception of whether ones income is adequate to satisfy ones needs. In addition, individual income perception is subject to the individuals own situation, past and present, as well as to the income of other people. The latter reflects the importance of the relative position of individuals in society for their satisfaction with life. This is often referred to as the comparison income or relative utility effect. It is often argued that individuals adapt to new situations by changing their expectations (Easterlin, 2005; Clark et al., 2008). This implies that higher incomes are accompanied by rising expectations that lead to what is known as the hedonic treadmill (Brickman and Campbell, 1971) or hedonic adaptation (Frederick and Loewenstein, 1999). Thus, individuals strive for high incomes even if these lead only to a temporary or small increase in well-being. This ability to adapt would appear to be a ubiquitous feature of the human condition, some recent examples of adaptation in nonmonetary spheres are Lucas et al. (2003) and Lucas (2005) with respect to marriage and divorce, Wu (2001) and Oswald and Powdthavee (2006) for adaptation to illness or disability, and Lucas et al. (2004) regarding unemployment. The comparisons with different social reference groups are also an important factor that has been widely present in the analysis of two dimensions; namely, the analysis of the effect of relative income on financial satisfaction and/or satisfaction with life as a whole (McBride, 2001; Stutzer, 2004; Luttmer, 2005; Clark, Frijters and Shields, 2008) and the influence of unemployment on subjective well-being. A standard result in happiness literature is that the unemployed report significantly lower levels of subjective well-being than other labor force groups (Winkelman and Winkelman, 1998; Frey and Stutzer, 2002). Indeed, the pecuniary and the non-pecuniary costs of the unemployment are that high that adaptation is non-existent (Lucas et al., 2004) or only very moderate (Clark, 2002). Clark (2003) uses seven waves of the British Household Panel Survey to test for social norms in labor market status. In his analysis, he found that the well-being of the unemployed is the higher, the hig her the unemployment rate in a reference group (at the regional, partner, or household level). It seems that, the more unemployment becomes the norm, the less individuals are affected by it (Winkelman, 2006). Lalive and Stutzer (2004), using a different strategy, obtain the same results for information from Sweden. Social interactions could be either a negative or a positive factor. As previously mentioned, an individuals happiness depends on that individuals own relative (or positional) situation or status, and comparison with others, what would expose that individual to negative externalities in terms of peer-effects (Luttmer, 2005) in utility and/or consumption. Alpizar, Carlsson and Johansson-Stenman (2005) show that positionality matters far more for commodities as houses and cars than for vacation and insurance, but also that both absolute and relative consumption matter for each category, these are positional goods. The positive influence of social interactions may come from social relationships and other relational goods or social capital factors. For instance, Rojas (2007), Winkelman (2006), Argyle (1999), among other social scientists have found that social relationships are a major source of well-being. Although marriage is the relationship that has the most influence on happiness, there are other relationships that affect happiness, as well as health and mental health, by providing social support. Argyle (1999 p. 361) refers some studies where it was found that if all kinds of social support are combined, a social support factor is found to have a strong correlation of 0.50 with happiness. Social scientists in many countries have observed that social support or social networks (and the associated norms of reciprocity and trust (Helliwell and Putnam, 2004)) have powerful effects on the level and efficiency of production and well-being, broadly defined, and they have used the term social capital to refer to these effects (Coleman, 1988; Putnam, 2000; Woolcock and Narayan, 2000). Lately, some cross-sectional studies from both sociology and economics have shown the importance of key aspects of social capital such as trust, social contacts and membership in voluntary associations over individual well-being (Inglehart 1999; Putnam 2000; Helliwell 2003 and 2006b; Powdthavee, 2008). In Bowling Alone, Putnam (2000) suggested that people prosper in neighborhoods and societies where social capital is high, that is, where people trust one another and are mutually helpful. Putnam reviewed evidence showing that communities with high rates of volunteer activity, club membership, church membership, and social entertaining (all thought to be indirect manifestations of social capital) all had higher well-being than communities that were impoverish these characteristics. Many studies that use cross-sectional data have shown that individuals with rich networks of active social relationships, that do not include people living in the same household, tend to be happier with th eir lives (Phillips 1967; Burt 1987). Helliwell (2003) reported that well-being is high and suicide rates are low where trust in others is high, and he also found that well-being is high where memberships in organizations outside of work are at high levels. Thus, there is evidence that individuals are more likely to experience high well-being when they live in nations with high social capital than when they live in nations with low social capital, a finding that dovetails with the results of studies on individuals social interactions. Helliwell and Putnam (2004) and Powdthavee (2008) are comprehensive reviews about the importance of social capital factor over subjective well-being. Health status is a factor that can be expected to be an important determinant of life satisfaction. In the 1950s the use of concepts such as welfare, adjustment and mental health had much in common with the traditional concept about happiness (Argyle, 1991). Research on the health-related quality of life was developed in the mid 1970s by health scientists and psychologists in order to track peoples perception of their health status (Gough et al., 2007). This was mainly in response to the need for more sensitive measures to compare treatments for chronic illness and to identify the most cost-effective treatments . Good health is considered an important factor included in the capabilities and the necessary functionalities in order for an individual to face life (Deaton, 2007; Sen, 1999). Since the 1980s the state of health has been identified as an important determinant of life satisfaction, as happy people are healthier, both physically and mentally (Veenhoven, 1991; Argyle, 1999). Co nsequently, poor health, which limits an individuals ability to carry out their daily activities, reduces overall satisfaction. The literature about subjective well-being in Latin American countries is few and very recent. Graham and Pettinato (2001) were some of the first to analyze Latin American countries. Using the Latinobarà ³metro 2000, they found that Latin America is not all that different from the advanced industrial economies in relation to some of the determinants of happiness. Similar to the OECD countries, happiness has a quadratic relationship with age, initially decreasing and then increasing monotonically after 49 years of age. As in the industrial countries, being married had positive and significant effects. In contrast to the advanced economies, a significant gender effect was no found in Latin America. Also, as in the industrial countries, the coefficients for level of wealth were strong, positive, and significant in happiness. When wealth was included in the regressions, the coefficient for education level became insignificant or weakly significant, depending on the regression used. Bein g self-employed or unemployed both had significant and negative effects on happiness. When they included country-fixed effects, the coefficient on self-employment became insignificant. While being unemployed also has negative effects on happiness in the advanced industrial economies, being self-employed has positive effects. The most credible explanation is intuitive and it was given by the authors: most self-employed people in the latter are self-employed by choice, while in developing economies, many are self-employed due to the absence of more secure employment opportunities and live a precarious existence in the informal sector. Other analyses by countries have been conducted in Latin America. Among the most important, Rojas (2006b and 2007), using the domains-of-life approach in Mexico, found that people are on average, more satisfied in the family domain, while they are less satisfied in the consumption, personal and job domains. Rojas (2007) found that income is an explanatory variable of relevancy for the economic and labor satisfaction, but not for either family or leisure satisfaction. Due to that, he found a weak relationship between income and life satisfaction Gerstenbluth et al. (2007) studied the relationship between happiness and health in Argentina and Uruguay using the Latinobarà ³metro 2004. Cruz and Torres (2006), using the Encuesta de Calidad de Vida 2003, tested various happiness hypotheses among Colombians and Cid et al. (2008), using the survey called Salud, Bienestar y Envejecimiento en Amà ©rica Latina y el Caribe (SABE), explored the correlation between happiness and income in the el derly in Uruguay. To our knowledge, the previous studies conducted about Latin America have not included the effect of social capital on subjective well-being, and they have analyzed the self-employment as a homogeneous labor market status. However, when considering the specificity of the leisure domain, we should take into account that while satisfaction with other realms of life may lie upon the valuation of objective situations (such as one’s financial situation, health or housing conditions), satisfaction with leisure brings in an additional challenge as individual’s boundaries of leisure are defined by her perception of what is pleasant (Ateca-Amestoy et al., 2008). Conceptual discussion on the nature of leisure time in contemporary societies Time allocation decisions within the family: economic approaches and models. We will attach to the economic approach to human behavior by Becker (moreover, bring arguments such as those contained in a theory of social interactions). Temporal autonomy is a matter of having discretionary control over your time. Discretionary Time. A New Measure of Freedom (Goodin et al., 2005) Other approaches: we have found these relevant arguments: Veblens theory The omnivore Bourdieus distinction Putnams social capital 3.1. What is Social Capital? There is a traditional consensus that there exists three distincs traditions that conceptualize and analyze social capital. All three would be relevant for our reasoning. Pierre Bourdieu bourdieu2: who conceptualised social capital as the `actual or potential resources that an individual has at his/her disposal as a result of `a durable network of more or less institutionalised relationships of mutual acquaintance and recognition, i.e. membership in a group. Some authors point out that this definition must be viewed as part of his broader concern with developing the different types of capital in order to explain the means by which the social stratification system is preserved and the dominant class-reproduction strategy is legitimised. J.S. Coleman coleman defines it as the set of resources that inhere in family relations and in community social organisations and that are useful for the cognitive or social development of a child or young person. Social relations were viewed by Coleman to make up important `capital resources for individuals by means of processes such as setting `obligations, expectations and trustworthiness, creating channels for information, and setting norms backed by efficient sanctions. These resources may be influenced by factors such as generalised trustworthiness which ensures that obligations are met, the extent to which a person is in