The study of happiness and well-being is receiving increased at tention in different fields. Recent research into well-being has focused on
delving deeper into the individual’s conception about the experience of
well-being. McMahan and Estes (2011a) created a scale that assesses lay
conceptions of well-being based on four dimensions: the experience of
pleasure, avoidance of negative experience, self-development and contribu tion to others. The goal of this study was to adapt this scale, the Beliefs
about Well-Being Scale (BWBS), to the Spanish population. The sample
consisted of 1,024 participants from the general population ranging in age
interval from 17 to 87 years old. The confirmatory factorial analysis results
in a structure of four dimensions, similar to the original scale, although in
the adaptation of the scale the items decrease from 16 to 12. The results of
the reliability analysis reveal indexes similar to those of the original scale.
These results confirm the validity of Beliefs about Well-Being Scale with
general population in a cultural context different from the original study.
This will allow cross-cultural studies to analyze the influence of culture in
the perception of well-being.
