Measuring wellbeing

How can we measure improvements in mental wellbeing?

Reasons to measure wellbeing

The reasons to measure people's wellbeing include:

to develop a baseline against which change in population or client wellbeing can be measured over time, eg as part of a local regeneration scheme
to help evaluate the effectiveness of a project or service on people's lives, eg to reduce isolation and loneliness among older people by measuring before and after an intervention
to find out which aspects of their lives people in Lambeth feel most unhappy about, eg to help prioritise funding decisions, the commissioning of local services and the delivery of local projects
to help achieve wider local economic, social and environmental priorities, as outlined in the Community Strategy and Local Area Agreement, eg to capture the things that underpin many of these aspirations and to track progress along the way
to help raise understanding among Lambeth residents about the different components of wellbeing and how to effect change in their lives, eg to support individuals feel in control of their own lives.

How to measure wellbeing

Wellbeing can also be measured in ways tailored to local circumstances, for example, by using standardised questions, either in a self-administered questionnaire or an interview. Using the nef Wellbeing Measurement Framework as an overall structure, people can be asked about:

How they feel about themselves (personal feelings) eg How happy are you?
To what extent to you feel a sense of meaning and purpose in your life?
Do you feel able to influence things in your individual life, local environment or wider society?
Do you feel you are dealt with fairly and confident that your interests are acknowledged?
How they function at a personal level (personal functioning)
What activities do you engage in, including those aspects of your life linked to enterprising activity and creativity?
How would you assess your skills and educational attainment?
How motivated are you?
To what extent do you feel in control, especially in work or financial terms?
How they feel in relation to those around them (social feelings)
Do you feel a sense of belonging to a community or place?
What is your experience of your neighbourhood, your friendships and support networks?
How they function in a social context (social functioning)
How do you relate to others, and how involved are you in social activities such as volunteering, work, hobbies, community groups?
How valued do you feel at work?
To what extent do you actively contribute to civil society, or vote?
How much do you put back into the local community?

For more detailed guidance, including how to use a Local Wellbeing Indicator Bank, download the handbook Measuring Wellbeing in Lambeth (also downloadable at the bottom of this page).

Mental Wellbeing Impact Assessment (MWIA) is a toolkit designed to be used by anyone with an interest in the potential mental health impact of policies or projects in a wide range of settings. These might include major strategic plans in a locality as well as regeneration, housing, and transport initiatives. Wellbeing indicators can then be developed from this process to measure and monitor how the policy/project addresses the key wellbeing factors, in order to maximise the positive mental wellbeing outcomes. As mental wellbeing is a cross sector priority this type of exercise should help to promote partnership working.

MWIA is based on the evidence of the determinants of mental wellbeing - meaning the factors that promote and protect mental well-being. It focuses on four factors identified by the Department of Health that are strongly associated with a positive impact on mental well-being. These are:

Enhancing control
Increasing resilience and community assets
Facilitating participation
Promoting inclusion

Several MWIAs have been carried out on services in Lambeth, including the Paxton Green Timebank, Expert Patient Programme, Fanon Resource Centre and the Lambeth Advocacy Service.

There are also a number of validated instruments designed to measure positive aspects of mental health, including:

Psychological Wellbeing Scale
Antonovsky's Sense of Coherence Scale
Bradburn Affect Balance Scale
Affectometer 2
Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale (WEMWBS)

The Measuring Wellbeing SWEMWBS Template (which can also be downloaded below) can be used to capture data from a WEMWBS survey. This useful tool then uses the results to automatically generate a number of statistics and graphs to aid with your analysis.

Measuring wellbeing/wellbeing audit tools for the workplace: