Subjective well-being in French and American samples: scale development and comparative data.

We introduce the English language version of a scale of subjective well-being that has proved reliable, valid, sensitive to change, and well suited to research on clinical populations in France. The internal consistency of both versions exceeds 0.80 and the data suggest that they are equivalent in meaning. In a comparative study of normal samples, American subjects scored significantly higher than French; the difference was greater for women than for men. Young French women in particular had lower scores, a finding interpreted in terms of contemporary socio-economic circumstances. We conclude that the two versions of the scale are useful for both within and cross-national research.