From Status to Satisfaction:
Social Success and Well-Being

To what extent does our life satisfaction depend on our social status? Humans are inherently social beings. In every society or community, some individuals occupy more central or influential positions than others—that is, they hold higher social status. Social comparison is an inseparable part of human life, and its influence has only grown in recent years, as people increasingly evaluate their self-worth through social media likes, academic degrees, or job titles. If social status plays a role in our happiness, then feeling “less than” others may carry a psychological cost.

Subjective well-being (SWB) refers to how we experience and evaluate our lives - how often we feel positive or negative emotions, and how satisfied we are with our lives overall. This subjective feeling is shaped by factors including relationships, personal achievements, a sense of purpose, physical health—and social standing. The SWB index is a tool used to assess mental health and life satisfaction. Though it primarily focuses on the mind, subjective well-being also has far-reaching effects on physical health and longevity. Psychologists use this measure to evaluate how patients feel about their lives, while policymakers rely on it to evaluate the health of societies and to measure the impacts of public policies.

In 1984, psychologist Ed Diener first introduced the model of subjective well-being, proposing that our perceived quality of life is shaped by three key components: the frequency of positive emotions, occasional experiences of negative emotions, and our overall life satisfaction. These elements, in turn, are influenced by a variety of external and internal factors—such as access to basic resources like food, personality traits, the presence of supportive social networks, thought patterns, a sense of self-efficacy, and the characteristics of the society we live in.

Studies have shown a link between a person’s social status—their relative position on the social ladder—and their subjective well-being. However, proving that this link is causal has proven difficult. In other words, a third factor, such as self-confidence, may influence both social status and subjective well-being. Another possibility is that subjective well-being shapes a person’s social status rather than results from it. A 2012 study suggested that our social status affects subjective well-being, but a later study failed to replicate this finding.

Studies point to a link between an individual's social status and their subjective well-being. Game blocks representing subjective well-being | 3rdtimeluckystudio, Shutterstock

Everything is Relative

A new study set out to reexamine whether an individual’s social status affects their level of subjective well-being. In the first part of the study, 230 students participated, and were divided into groups of five.  Each participant began by completing personality and emotion recognition questionnaires on a computer. Next, they were shown fabricated summaries of the other group members’ results. Based on this information, they were asked to rank each group member’s social status, under the impression that these rankings would help determine who would lead a subsequent group task—which, in reality, never occurred.

Participants were not shown the real results of their own questionnaires. Instead, they received false feedback about their social status within the group, being told that their peers had rated them either relatively low (a 4 on a 1–7 scale) or relatively high (a 6). Additionally, they were told that the average status of the other group members was either low (4) or high (6). This created four possible scenarios: high or low personal status within a group of high or low average status.  Following this, participants completed questionnaires assessing their subjective well-being—specifically, how good they felt about themselves.

The results showed that participants reported higher subjective well-being when they believed their own status was high. Moreover, their reported SWB was even higher when they perceived the other group members’ status as lower than their own. Conversely, participants who believed they had lower status than others in the group reported significantly reduced SWB. In short, the study provided evidence of a causal link between perceived social status and subjective well-being.

In the second phase of the study, involving 405 students, researchers explored whether boosting a sense of self-worth could buffer the negative effects of low social status on subjective well-being. To this end, before receiving  any feedback, some participants were asked to complete a self-affirmation task: they selected three values that were important to them and explained why those values mattered. The control group was instructed to choose the three least important values and write about why those values might be meaningful to someone else.

The results showed that in most scenarios, self-affirmation had little effect on subjective well-being. Only when both the participant's own status and the group's average status were high did self-affirmation increase subjective well-being compared to the control group. This suggests that when people feel confident in their own status, they may be less inclined to compete and still experience greater subjective well-being - even when surrounded by others who are of high-status.

The researchers concluded that subjective well-being is influenced not only by one’s own social status but also by how that status compares to others. Moreover, the effects of social status on subjective well-being appear largely resistant to brief self-worth interventions. Since all participants were college students in the United States, further research is needed to determine whether the findings apply to different populations and to real-world settings outside the lab.

It’s also important to remember that social status is only one factor influencing overall subjective well-being. Practices such as mindfulness, which cultivates awareness of the present moment, and cognitive-behavioral strategies, which help reframe automatic negative thought patterns, can be highly effective. In addition, building positive relationships, engaging in regular physical activity, expressing gratitude, and setting meaningful personal goals can all contribute to greater subjective well-being and life satisfaction.