Measures of Indigenous social capital and their relationship with well-being

Abstract

Objective: To provide the first estimates of a comprehensive measure of social capital for the Indigenous population and to link the indicators to well-being. Design: Observational study-based. Setting: Household survey. Participants: Nationally representative sample of 7823 Indigenous Australians aged 15years and over who were usual residents of private dwellings. Main outcome measure: Whether or not the respondent felt happy in the last 4weeks all or most of the time (happiness), and whether or not they felt so sad that nothing could cheer them up at least a little bit of the time over the same period (sadness). Results: There were no consistent differences in social capital measures between Indigenous men and women, nor were there consistent differences between the remote and non-remote population. High levels of social capital were, however, associated with higher subjective well-being. Conclusion: Social capital is both an indicator and determinant of well-being. It was possible to derive an index of social capital for Indigenous Australians that had a strong positive association with self-reported happiness and a negative association with self-reported sadness. However, the analysis also showed that there are a set of related domains of social capital, rather than there being a single underlying concept.