What are the determinants of people’s subjective sense of satisfaction in the place in which they live? What matters most to different cohorts at different times in their lives in different places?

Background

This section sets out the key areas where we want to deepen our understanding to drive the levelling up agenda, and to unleash opportunity, prosperity and pride in place across the UK. In addition, we want to understand in more granular detail which interventions best drive local growth (local growth is an area of joint responsibility between BEIS and DLUHC).

Next steps

The lead contacts are: Lesley Smith, Senior Principal Research Officer, Analysis, Research and Co-ordination Unit, Analysis and Data Directorate: Lesley.Smith@levellingup.gov.uk and David Hughes, Head of the Chief Scientific Adviser’s office: psChiefScientificAdviser@levellingup.gov.uk.

Source

This question was published as part of the set of ARIs in this document:

DLUHC Areas of research interest GOVUK

Related UKRI funded projects

  • Measuring and Valuing City Wellbeing

    ‘Measuring and Valuing City Wellbeing’ project will further develop and trial at scale Happy City’s suite of pioneering and innovative online digital tools aimed at transforming how we approach urban living. This unique ...

    Funded by: Innovate UK

    Lead research organisation: HAPPY CITY CIC

    Why might this be relevant?

    The project 'Measuring and Valuing City Wellbeing' provides a suite of online digital tools aimed at transforming how we approach urban living and improving the wellbeing of people and place, which directly addresses the question.

  • Insecure lives and the policy disconnect: How multiple insecurities affect Levelling Up and what joined-up policy can do to help

    Introduction Millions of UK residents are worrying about multiple issues such as money, housing, health and caring responsibilities. Individual insecurities may build up and combine. They may prevent households using the...

    Funded by: ESRC

    Lead research organisation: London School of Economics and Political Science

    Why might this be relevant?

    The project directly addresses the determinants of people's subjective sense of satisfaction in the place they live and how insecurities impact participation in Levelling Up.

  • Translating Children's Geographies of Happiness into Childhood-friendly Social and Urban Policies in Latin America.

    My doctoral research explored how cities are experienced by children and adolescents on an everyday basis, and how those experiences impacted their levels of happiness. The project explored how children's and adolescent'...

    Funded by: ESRC

    Lead research organisation: Loughborough University

    Why might this be relevant?

    The project 'Translating Children's Geographies of Happiness into Childhood-friendly Social and Urban Policies in Latin America' explores how cities are experienced by children and adolescents and how those experiences impact their levels of happiness, which directly addresses the question.

  • Valuing the health benefits of city well-being

    A large body of research shows that improvements in well-being have a significant causal impact on better health. However, these benefits have yet to be quantified. In order for local policymakers to make well-being poli...

    Funded by: Innovate UK

    Lead research organisation: HAPPY CITY CIC

    Why might this be relevant?

    The project 'Valuing the health benefits of city well-being' quantifies the health benefits caused by improvements in well-being, but does not directly address the question of determinants of people's subjective sense of satisfaction in the place they live.

  • Bringing wellbeing to community

    There is more and more evidence on what determines people's wellbeing (how they experience their lives), and what activities can increase people's wellbeing. The UK's Office for National Statistics began in 2011 to condu...

    Funded by: ESRC

    Lead research organisation: University of Liverpool

  • Stay Happy: Understanding Urban Wellbeing Using a Behavioural Machine Learning Approach

    Recent advances in information and communication technology (ICT) have created opportunities for the public sector to increase citizens' wellbeing by better understanding their preferences. Machine learning, a subfield o...

    Funded by: ESRC

    Lead research organisation: University of Birmingham

  • Innovating Resident Connectedness for Health & Wellbeing

    A collaboration between an industry-leading urban development corporation and a human-centred design consultancy to develop innovative ideas that improve connectedness for new residents of Ebbsfleet Garden City (EGC) -- ...

    Funded by: Innovate UK

    Lead research organisation: EBBSFLEET DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION

  • The Analysis of Well-being Parameters Operating within the Environment of Castle Vale - the Application of Systems Approaches (a Pilot Study)

    Research examines the relationship between health and the environment to look at the complexity of the factors that impact upon personal well-being, responding to the EPSRC call on 'Systems Approaches to Well-being' by t...

    Funded by: EPSRC

    Lead research organisation: Birmingham City University

  • The Many Dimensions of Wellbeing

    Government policies are often justified by their potential contribution to the growth of GDP, and yet the sense that it is a flawed measure, failing to capture much of people's experience of economic progress (or otherwi...

    Funded by: ESRC

    Lead research organisation: University of Cambridge

  • Feeling Towns: the role of place and identity in governance and local policy

    The emphasis on pride and place in cultural policy initiatives has become commonplace - it is, for example, core to the 2021 Levelling Up Prospectus. Yet the concept, experience, and mechanics of civic pride and place at...

    Funded by: AHRC

    Lead research organisation: University of Southampton

    Why might this be relevant?

    The project specifically focuses on the determinants of people's subjective sense of satisfaction in the place they live and aims to explore methods and metrics of civic pride and place attachment.

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Effective approaches to reducing regional disparities How can levels of civil society and of pride in place in a local area be increased? Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport, 2023
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