Contradictory effects of religiosity on subjective well-being

Figures & data

Table 1. Sample countries and the world values survey (WVS) waves

Albania (4)	Estonia (3, 6)	Lithuania (3)	Slovenia (3, 6)
Algeria (4)	Ethiopia (5)	Macedonia (3, 5)	S. Africa (all 5 waves)
Argentina (all 5 waves)	Finland (3, 5)	Malaysia (5, 6)	S. Korea (all 5 waves)
Armenia (3)	France (5)	Mali (5)	Spain (all 5 waves)
Australia (3, 6)	Georgia (3, 5, 6)	Mexico (all 5 waves)	Sweden (3, 4, 5, 6)
Azerbaijan (3, 6)	Germany (3, 5, 6)	Moldova (3, 4, 5)	Switzerland (2, 3, 5)
Bahrain (6)	Ghana (5, 6)	Morocco (4, 5, 6)	Taiwan (3, 4, 6)
Bangladesh (3, 4)	Guatemala (5)	Netherlands (5, 6)	Tanzania (4)
Belarus (2&3)	Hong Kong (5, 6)	New Zealand (4, 5, 6)	Thailand (5, 6)
Bosnia & Herz. (3, 4)	Hungary (3)	Nigeria (2, 3, 4, 6)	Trinidad & Tobago (5, 6)
Brazil (2, 3, 5, 6)	India (all 5 waves)	Norway (4, 5)	Tunisia (6)
Bulgaria (5)	Indonesia (4, 5)	Pakistan (3, 4, 6)	Turkey (all 5 waves)
Burkina Faso (5)	Iran (4, 5)	Peru (3, 4, 5, 6)	Uganda (4)
Canada (4, 5)	Iraq (4, 5, 6)	Philippines (3, 4, 6)	Ukraine (3, 5, 6)
Chile (all 5 waves)	Israel (4)	Poland (2, 3, 5, 6)	UK (3, 5)
China (all 5 waves)	Italy (5)	Puerto Rico (3, 4)	Uruguay (3, 5, 6)
Colombia (3, 5, 6)	Japan (all 5 waves)	Qatar (6)	USA (3, 4, 5, 6)
Croatia (3)	Jordan (4, 5, 6)	Romania (4, 5, 6)	Uzbekistan (6)
Cyprus (5, 6)	Kazakhstan (6)	Russian Fed. (2, 3, 5, 6)	Venezuela (3, 4)
Czech Republic (2)	Kuwait (6)	Rwanda (5, 6)	Vietnam (4, 5)
Dominican Rep. (3)	Kyrgyzstan (4, 6)	Saudi Arabia (4)	West Bank & Gaza (6)
Ecuador (6)	Latvia (3)	Serbia (3, 4, 5)	Yemen (6)
Egypt (4, 5, 6)	Lebanon (6)	Singapore (4, 6)	Zambia (5, 6)
El Salvador (3)	Libya (6)	Slovakia (2, 4, 5)	Zimbabwe (4, 6)

Note: The article uses the following five waves of the WVS: Wave 2 (1990–1994), Wave 3 (1995–1998), Wave 4 (1999–2004), Wave 5 (2005–2009), and Wave 6 (2010–2014). The numbers in parentheses indicate the wave numbers in which the sample countries are included.

Table 2. Description of the variables from the world values survey (WVS)

Variable name	Description
Feeling of happiness	1: not at all happy 2: not very happy 3: quite happy 4: very happy
Satisfaction with life	1: not at all satisfied 2: somewhat satisfied 3: satisfied
Subjective health	1: poor 2: fair 3: good 4: very good
Freedom of choice and control over life	1: none at all 2: some 3: a great deal
Religious person	1: atheist 2: not a religious person 3: religious person
Relevance of religion in your life	1: not important at all 2: not very important 3: rather important 4: very important
Gender	1: Female 0: Male
Age	Two-digit number
Marital status	1: divorced/separated/widow 2: single 3: in a relationship 4: married
Social class	1: lower class 2: working class 3: lower middle class 4: upper middle class 5: upper class

Note: The data are available at http://www.worldvaluessurvey.org. In some of the variables, the number of categories is reduced based on the histograms of these variables. In other variables, the categories are recoded so that in all variables higher values indicate higher representation of the characteristic in question for easier interpretation.

Table 3. Definition of country-level economic, social and institutional variables

Variable name	Definition	Source
Happiness-WHR (World Happiness Report)	An index number between 1 to 10 where higher values indicate higher levels of happiness; 2013	(Helliwell et al., 2013)
Corruption control	Perceptions of the extent to which public power is exercised for private gain, including both petty and grand forms of corruption, as well as “capture” of the state by elites and private interests; values range between −2.5 and 2.5 where higher numbers indicate greater corruption control; 1996–2014 average	WGI
Government effectiveness	Perceptions of the quality of public service, the quality of the civil service and the degree of its independence from political pressures, the quality of policy formulation and implementation, and the credibility of government’s commitment to such policies; values range between −2.5 and 2.5 where higher values indicate higher government effectiveness; 1996–2014 average	WGI
Regulatory quality	Perceptions of the ability of the government to formulate and implement sound policies and regulations that permit and promote private sector development; values range between −2.5 to 2.5 where higher values indicate higher regulatory quality; 1996–2014 average	WGI
Rule of law	Perceptions of the extent to which agents have confidence in and abide by the rules of society, and in particular the quality of contract enforcement, property rights, the police, and the courts, as well as the likelihood of crime and violence; values range between −2.5 to 2.5 where higher values indicate higher confidence in law enforcement; 1996–2014 average	WGI
Executive constraints	Characteristics of the political decision-making process grouped in 7 categories, involving measures of constitutional restrictions as well as the severity of attempts to circumvent the rules; values range between 1 and 7 where higher numbers indicate stronger constraints on the executive; 1990–2014 average	Polity IV
Economic freedom	Based on 10 categories of freedom, including property rights, freedom from corruption, trade freedom, etc.; values range between 1 and 100 where higher numbers indicate a greater extent of economic freedom; 2010	Heritage Foundation
Tertiary Enrolment	Percent of relevant age group enrolled in tertiary education; 1990–2014 average	WDI
Income	GDP per capita (PPP); 1990–2014 average	WDI

Note: The World Happiness Report is available at http://unsdsn.org/resources/publications/world-happiness-report-2013. WGI stands for the Worldwide Governance Indicators and is available at http://info.worldbank.org/governance/wgi/index.aspx#home. Polity IV Project is available at http://www.systemicpeace.org/inscrdata.html. Economic freedom index is available at http://www.heritage.org/index/. WDI stands for the World Development Indicators (World Bank) and is available at https://data.worldbank.org/products/wdi.

Table 4. Category frequencies of the relevant variables

Variables and response categories	All respondents	Variables and response categories	All respondents
Feeling of happiness (N = 339,909)		Subjective health (N = 336,251)
Not at all happy	3.05	Poor	7.36
Not very happy	16.30	Fair	27.09
Quite happy	52.40	Good	42.20
Very happy	28.25	Very good	23.35
Satisfaction with life (N = 342,450)		Social status (N = 290,581)
Not at all satisfied	18.35	Lower class	13.63
Quite satisfied	35.56	Working class	28.04
Satisfied	46.06	Lower middle class	37.39
		Upper middle class	19.07
Religious person (N = 317,398)		Upper class	1.86
Atheist	4.76	Gender (N = 347,856)
Not a religious person	24.49	Male	49.04
Religious person	70.76	Female	50.96
Relevance of religion in life (N = 328,209)
Not important at all	11.07	Marital status (N = 343,116)
Not very important	16.76	Divorced/separated/widowed	11.01
Rather important	23.38	Single	24.90
Very important	48.78	In a relationship	6.06
		Married	58.03
Freedom of choice & control over life (N = 327,554)
Not at all	15.34
Some	39.83
A great deal	44.83

Note: Age, the only continuous variable, at the respondent-level data is not included in the table.

With 338,145 valid responses to the question of age, the mean age is almost 41 (40.78) with a standard deviation of 16.09.

Table 5. Spearman correlation coefficients between happiness, life satisfaction and other categorical variables (N = 249,326)

	Happiness	Life satisfaction
Life satisfaction	0.42*
Freedom	0.23*	0.36*
Relevance of religion	0.09*	−0.02*
Religious person	0.04*	−0.02*
Gender	0.01*	0.01*
Marital status	0.07*	0.03*
Social class	0.17*	0.21*
Health	0.37*	0.28*

Note: * indicates 5% level of statistical significance.

See Table 2 for variable description.

Table 6. Generalized ordered logistic regression estimations using the WVS data

	Dependent variable: Happiness		Dependent variable: Life satisfaction
Explanatory variables	k−1 categories	Model I	k−1 categories	Model II
Gender		0.17***		0.20***
Age		−0.03*		−0.02***
Age square		0.0004***		0.0004***
Marital status	1	0.24***		0.09***
	2	0.23***
	3	0.14***
Social class	1	0.44***	1	0.38***
	2	0.34***	2	0.28***
	3	0.12***
Health		0.89***		0.58***
Freedom	1	0.57***		0.96***
	2	0.54***
	3	0.44***
Religious person	1	−0.04		−0.09*
	2	–0.01
	3	0.28***
N		253,575		254,138
Wald χ^2 (p-val)		0.00		0.00

Note: All estimations use generalized ordered logit regressions with the robust variance estimator. ***, **, and * indicate 1, 5, and 10% level of significance based on the z statistic. Constants are not shown. k-1 categories refer to the number of response categories minus one (See Table 2 for response categories). The dependent variable happiness has 4 response categories so that 1 refers to contrasting Category 1 with Categories 2, 3, and 4. Similarly, 2 contrasts Categories 1 and 2 with categories 3 and 4, while 3 contrasts Categories 1, 2, and 3 with Category 4. The alternative dependent variable is satisfaction with life that has 3 response categories. In this case, 1 contrasts Category 1 with 2 and 3, while 2 contrasts Categories 1 and 2 with 3.

Table 7. Descriptive statistics (cross-section data)

Variables	Number of obs.	Mean	Standard deviation	Minimum	Maximum
Happiness—WVS	96	3.06	0.27	2.43	3.61
Satisfaction with life—WVS	96	2.26	0.29	1.57	2.79
Happiness—WHR	95	5.65	0.99	3.72	7.67
Relevance of religion—WVS	95	3.11	0.66	1.61	3.99
Religious person—WVS	95	2.66	0.24	1.88	2.97
Freedom—WVS	95	2.29	0.21	1.83	2.69
Corruption control	96	0.09	1.01	−1.37	2.31
Government effectiveness	96	0.22	0.96	−1.51	2.25
Regulatory quality	96	0.17	0.95	−2.15	1.89
Rule of law	96	−0.07	0.99	−1.97	1.98
Executive constraints	92	4.34	2.02	1	7
Economic freedom	94	62.91	11.77	16.2	90.1
Tertiary enrolment	94	26.02	19.94	0.32	95.21
GDP per capita	95	18,486	17,026	559	102,211

Note: WVS indicates that the variables represent country means based on the WVS data. WHR stands for the World Happiness Report. Tables 2 and 3 define the VWS variables and the country-level variables, respectively.

Table 8. Correlation coefficients (cross-section data)

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13
2. Satisfaction with life	0.76*
3. Happiness—WHR	0.47*	0.72*
4. Freedom	0.71*	0.84*	0.61*
5. Relevance of religion	0.18	−0.11	−0.41*	0.07
6. Religious person	−0.02	−0.25*	−0.41*	−0.06	0.78*
7. Corruption control	0.28*	0.49*	0.69*	0.33*	−0.54*	−0.49*
8. Executive constraints	0.08	0.22*	0.47*	0.17	−0.53*	−0.29*	0.58*
9. Economic freedom	0.16	0.31*	0.42*	0.21	−0.42*	−0.33*	0.76*	0.45*
10. Government effectiveness	0.29*	0.49*	0.69*	0.32*	−0.56*	−0.51*	0.95*	0.61*	0.78*
11. Regulatory quality	0.16	0.39*	0.58*	0.26*	−0.57*	−0.46*	0.89*	0.62*	0.86*	0.93*
12. Rule of law	0.25*	0.46*	0.66*	0.29*	−0.53*	−0.48*	0.96*	0.61*	0.78*	0.98*	0.93*
13. GDP per capita	0.31*	0.52*	0.69*	0.34*	−0.41*	−0.41*	0.78*	0.35*	0.58*	0.76*	0.69*	0.77*
14. Tertiary enrolment	0.03	0.25*	0.43*	0.12*	−0.41*	−0.32*	0.42*	0.38*	0.28*	0.44*	0.38*	0.43*	0.39*

Note: Variable 1 is happiness. * indicates 5% level of significance. See Tables 2 and 3 for variable description.

Table 9. Baseline OLS estimations (using the cross-section data)

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12
Panel A—Dependent variable: Happiness (WVS)
Freedom-WVS	0.79	0.91	0.88	0.78	0.87	0.82	0.88	0.94	0.92	0.87	0.92	0.89
	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)
Relevance of religion-WVS	0.11	0.07	0.08	0.12	0.08	0.09
	(0.01)	(0.03)	(0.02)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.01)
Religious person-WVS							0.07	0.02	0.04	0.09	0.01	0.06
							(0.45)	(0.84)	(0.68)	(0.36)	(0.88)	(0.49)
Corruption control	0.06						0.02
	(0.02)						(0.27)
Executive constraints		0.01						−0.01
		(0.51)						(0.65)
Economic freedom			0.002						0.001
			(0.15)						(0.68)
Government effectiveness				0.07						0.03
				(0.02)						(0.17)
Regulatory quality					0.03						−0.01
					(0.31)						(0.84)
Rule of law						0.05						0.02
						(0.03)						(0.31)
Constant	0.91	0.73	0.66	0.89	0.99	0.88	0.85	0.88	0.82	0.83	0.91	0.85
	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.01)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.01)	(0.02)	(0.01)	(0.01)	(0.01)
N	95	91	93	95	95	95	95	91	93	95	95	95
R^2	0.54	0.52	0.52	0.55	0.52	0.54	0.49	0.49	0.49	0.51	0.49	0.49
F-test (p-val)	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00
Panel B—Dependent variable: Life satisfaction (WVS)
Freedom-WVS	1.14	1.26	1.22	1.13	1.19	1.15	1.14	1.21	1.19	1.14	1.17	1.15
	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)
Relevance of religion-WVS	−0.02	−0.07	−0.05	−0.01	−0.04	−0.02
	(0.48)	(0.02)	(0.06)	(0.64)	(0.19)	(0.39)
Religious person-WVS							−0.15	−0.24	−0.21	−0.14	−0.19	−0.16
							(0.04)	(0.01)	(0.01)	(0.06)	(0.02)	(0.03)
Corruption control	0.06						0.05
	(0.04)						(0.01)
Executive constraints		0.04						0.003
		(0.06)						(0.74)
Economic freedom			0.002						0.002
			(0.10)						(0.09)
Government effectiveness				0.07						0.06
				(0.01)						(0.01)
Regulatory quality					0.05						0.04
					(0.05)						(0.07)
Rule of law						0.06						0.05
						(0.00)						(0.01)
Constant	−0.29	−0.39	−0.53	−0.19	−0.36	−0.31	0.05	0.12	−0.06	0.01	0.06	0.04
	(0.14)	(0.05)	(0.01)	(0.37)	(0.08)	(0.12)	(0.84)	(0.69)	(0.84)	(0.96)	(0.82)	(0.87)
N	95	91	93	95	95	95	95	91	93	95	95	95
R^2	0.75	0.72	0.73	0.76	0.74	0.75	0.76	0.74	0.75	0.77	0.76	0.77
F-test (p-val)	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00
Panel C—Dependent variable: Happiness (WHR)
Freedom-WVS	2.35	2.88	2.92	2.37	2.67	2.46	2.15	2.58	2.63	2.18	2.43	2.26
	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)
Relevance of religion-WVS	−0.29	−0.52	−0.56	−0.29	−0.41	−0.33
	(0.02)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.03)	(0.00)	(0.01)
Religious person-WVS							−0.57	−1.27	−1.19	−0.52	−0.82	−0.64
							(0.11)	(0.00)	(0.01)	(0.15)	(0.03)	(0.07)
Corruption control	0.41						0.46
	(0.00)						(0.00)
Executive constraints		0.08						0.13
		(0.09)						(0.00)
Economic freedom			0.01						0.02
			(0.15)						(0.03)
Government effectiveness				0.42						0.48
				(0.00)						(0.00)
Regulatory quality					0.29						0.37
					(0.00)						(0.00)
Rule of law						0.38						0.44
						(0.00)						(0.00)
Constant	1.16	−0.31	−0.02	1.02	0.74	1.01	2.19	2.57	1.73	1.92	2.19	2.15
	(0.14)	(0.73)	(0.92)	(0.19)	(0.34)	(0.21)	(0.07)	(0.08)	(0.25)	(0.12)	(0.09)	(0.09)
N	94	91	93	94	94	94	94	91	93	94	94	94
R^2	0.66	0.58	0.58	0.66	0.61	0.65	0.65	0.58	0.54	0.65	0.59	0.64
F-test (p-val)	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00

Note: Numbers in parentheses are p-values. All estimations use the robust variance estimator. The variables with “WVS” indicate that they are the country means based on the WVS data. See Tables 2 and 3 for variable description.

Table 10. Two-stage least square estimations (using the cross-section data)

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12
Panel A—Dependent variable: Happiness (WVS)
Freedom—WVS	0.63	0.86	0.85	0.59	0.78	0.69	0.78	0.96	0.92	0.73	0.93	0.84
	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)
Relevance of religion—WVS	0.31	−0.02	0.06	0.34	0.17	0.28
	(0.04)	(0.97)	(0.42)	(0.06)	(0.14)	(0.06)
Religious person—WVS							1.04	−0.07	0.04	1.39	0.08	0.76
							(0.22)	(0.78)	(0.87)	(0.26)	(0.83)	(0.24)
Corruption control	0.14						0.18
	(0.03)						(0.09)
Executive constraints		0.02						−0.01
		(0.19)						(0.51)
Economic freedom			0.004						0.001
			(0.07)						(0.72)
Government effectiveness				0.18						0.21
				(0.02)						(0.07)
Regulatory quality					0.08						0.005
					(0.09)						(0.91)
Rule of law						0.13						0.11
						(0.03)						(0.15)
Constant	0.65	0.93	0.69	0.59	0.67	0.61	−1.19	1.14	0.79	−2.35	0.71	−0.89
	(0.05)	(0.01)	(0.06)	(0.11)	(0.04)	(0.09)	(0.49)	(0.16)	(0.35)	(0.45)	(0.52)	(0.61)
N	93	90	92	93	93	93	93	90	92	93	93	93
1^st stage F-test (p-val)	0.06	0.00	0.00	0.04	0.06	0.05	0.08	0.03	0.01	0.07	0.18	0.36
Hausman endog. test (p-val)	0.04	0.31	0.04	0.07	0.08	0.06	0.03	0.07	0.06	0.05	0.17	0.19
Sargan overid. test (p-val)	0.31	0.01	0.32	0.54	0.14	0.35	0.13	0.18	0.21	0.39	0.06	0.03
Panel B—Dependent variable: Life satisfaction (WVS)
Freedom—WVS	1.21	1.41	1.31	1.19	1.32	1.25	1.24	1.22	1.21	1.23	1.24	1.23
	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)
Relevance of religion—WVS	−0.18	−0.32	−0.22	−0.07	−0.19	−0.13
	(0.07)	(0.00)	(0.02)	(0.56)	(0.08)	(0.28)
Religious							−0.86	−0.99	−0.81	−0.81	−1.03	−0.93
person—WVS							(0.07)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.27)	(0.05)	(0.15)
Corruption control	0.14						0.16
	(0.08)						(0.06)
Executive constraints		0.05						−0.02
		(0.12)						(0.16)
Economic freedom			−0.002						−0.001
			(0.56)						(0.53)
Government effectiveness				0.15						0.13
				(0.03)						(0.07)
Regulatory quality					−0.02						−0.06
					(0.73)						(0.32)
Rule of law						0.02						−0.04
						(0.69)						(0.61)
Constant	−0.25	0.27	0.02	−0.27	−0.16	−0.21	1.71	2.27	1.73	1.61	2.18	1.91
	(0.28)	(0.46)	(0.95)	(0.26)	(0.56)	(0.41)	(0.26)	(0.02)	(0.03)	(0.36)	(0.09)	(0.22)
N	93	90	92	93	93	93	93	90	92	93	93	93
1^st stage F-test (p-val)	0.04	0.00	0.00	0.09	0.06	0.12	0.03	0.03	0.01	0.04	0.08	0.06
Hausman endog. test (p-val)	0.07	0.00	0.00	0.08	0.09	0.32	0.05	0.00	0.00	0.06	0.00	0.08
Sargan overid. test (p-val)	0.01	0.12	0.09	0.01	0.13	0.03	0.26	0.32	0.39	0.27	0.33	0.34
Panel C—Dependent variable: Happiness (WHR)
Freedom–WVS	2.91	3.63	3.47	2.94	3.46	3.11	2.81	2.44	2.64	2.91	2.81	2.78
	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)
Relevance of religion–WVS	−0.91	−1.91	−1.61	−0.93	−1.47	−1.13
	(0.07)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.08)	(0.01)	(0.03)
Religious person-WVS							−5.98	−5.85	−5.59	−6.58	−6.71	−6.29
							(0.16)	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.25)	(0.04)	(0.09)
Corruption control	0.15						−0.21
	(0.47)						(0.68)
Executive constraints		0.18						−0.03
		(0.07)						(0.75)
Economic freedom			−0.02						−0.01
			(0.13)						(0.29)
Government effectiveness				0.14						−0.33
				(0.56)						(0.66)
Regulatory quality					−0.17						−0.33
					(0.47)						(0.34)
Rule of law						0.06						0.24
						(0.76)						(0.59)
Constant	1.83	4.07	3.64	1.77	2.31	2.05	15.14	15.78	15.24	16.57	17.09	16.04
	(0.07)	(0.07)	(0.02)	(0.09)	(0.08)	(0.07)	(0.15)	(0.01)	(0.00)	(0.24)	(0.04)	(0.12)
N	93	90	92	93	93	93	93	90	92	93	93	93
1^st stage F-test (p-val)	0.07	0.00	0.00	0.09	0.06	0.07	0.43	0.03	0.01	0.55	0.08	0.06
Hausman endog. test (p-val)	0.05	0.00	0.00	0.07	0.02	0.06	0.01	0.00	0.00	0.01	0.00	0.00
Sargan overid. test (p-val)	0.25	0.12	0.13	0.18	0.05	0.16	0.48	0.41	0.65	0.48	0.54	0.56

Notes: The variables with “WVS” indicate that they are the country means of the WVS data. The numbers in parentheses refer to p values associated with z statistic. Instruments for religiosity are GDP per capita and tertiary education. All estimations use the robust variance estimator. See Tables 2 and 3 for variable description.

Table 11. Tests on country rankings among the relevant variables

	Happiness-WVS	Life satisfaction-WVS	Happiness-WHR
Relevance of religion	483	−347	−1197
	(0.12)	(0.27)	(0.00)
Religious person	−35	−901	1449
	(0.91)	(0.00)	(0.00)
Corruption control	749	1473	1940
	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)
Government effectiveness	836	1554	1963
	(0.00)	(0.00)	(0.00)
Rule of law	717	1447	1863
	(0.02)	(0.00)	(0.00)
Economic freedom	485	1135	1463
	(0.11)	(0.00)	(0.00)
Regulatory quality	610	1396	1847
	(0.05)	(0.00)	(0.00)
Executive constraints	298	698	1288
	(0.31)	(0.02)	(0.00)

Note: The first number in each cell indicates the Kendall’s score. The numbers in parentheses are p-values associated with the score. Kendall’s scores in each cell refer to the variable in the relevant row and the column and tests whether the two rankings are independent, which is the null hypothesis. See Tables 2 and 3 for variable description.

Table 12. Top and bottom 20 countries in SWB, religiosity and corruption control

Country	Happiness (WVS)	Country	Satisfaction (WVS)	Country	Happiness (WHR)	Country	Religious person	Country	Corruption control
Panel A: Top 20 countries
Uzbekistan	3.61	Ecuador	2.79	Norway	7.66	Mali	2.97	Finland	2.31
Qatar	3.54	Qatar	2.76	Switzerland	7.65	Egypt	2.96	New Zealand	2.30
Tanzania	3.51	Uzbekistan	2.74	Netherlands	7.51	Rwanda	2.95	Sweden	2.22
Ecuador	3.49	Netherlands	2.73	Canada	7.48	Nigeria	2.95	Singapore	2.18
El Salvador	3.47	Colombia	2.72	Sweden	7.48	Pakistan	2.95	Norway	2.11
Venezuela	3.46	Switzerland	2.69	Finland	7.39	Ghana	2.95	Netherlands	2.09
Malaysia	3.43	Puerto Rico	2.68	Australia	7.35	Qatar	2.95	Switzerland	2.09
Canada	3.41	Finland	2.66	Israel	7.3	Georgia	2.94	Canada	1.98
Puerto Rico	3.39	Norway	2.64	New Zealand	7.22	Tanzania	2.93	Australia	1.95
Trinidad	3.38	Mexico	2.63	Mexico	7.09	Uganda	2.93	Germany	1.84
Colombia	3.36	Sweden	2.62	USA	7.08	Morocco	2.92	UK	1.83
Saudi Arabia	3.35	New Zealand	2.62	Venezuela	7.04	Yemen	2.91	Hong Kong	1.73
Sweden	3.35	Canada	2.61	UK	6.88	Zimbabwe	2.90	USA	1.52
Nigeria	3.34	Guatemala	2.59	Brazil	6.85	Bangladesh	2.90	Chile	1.46
Kuwait	3.33	Kazakhstan	2.58	France	6.76	B. Faso	2.90	France	1.38
Switzerland	3.32	USA	2.58	Germany	6.67	Poland	2.89	Japan	1.35
Philippines	3.32	Australia	2.58	Qatar	6.67	Zambia	2.89	Spain	1.17
Australia	3.32	Bahrain	2.55	Chile	6.59	Iran	2.88	Uruguay	1.16
Thailand	3.32	Kuwait	2.55	Argentina	6.56	Romania	2.87	Cyprus	1.09
UK	3.32	Singapore	2.54	Singapore	6.55	Jordan	2.86	Israel	0.97
Panel B: Bottom 20 countries
Macedonia	2.82	Serbia	1.99	Bangladesh	4.81	Algeria	2.51	Dominican R.	−0.72
W. Bank-Gaza	2.79	Russia	1.99	Bosnia	4.81	Uruguay	2.46	Albania	−0.73
Egypt	2.78	Uganda	1.98	Serbia	4.81	Australia	2.45	Ecuador	−0.74
Estonia	2.78	Egypt	1.96	Hungary	4.78	New Zealand	2.43	Lebanon	−0.75
Zambia	2.77	Zimbabwe	1.95	India	4.77	Netherlands	2.40	Indonesia	−0.82
Georgia	2.76	Bosnia	1.94	W. Bank-Gaza	4.70	Norway	2.39	Uganda	−0.88
Croatia	2.75	B. Faso	1.91	Iran	4.64	UK	2.39	Pakistan	−0.97
Serbia	2.75	Macedonia	1.89	Azerbaijan	4.61	Taiwan	2.38	Russia	−0.98
Armenia	2.75	Belarus	1.85	Macedonia	4.57	Hungary	2.35	Ukraine	−0.99
Latvia	2.73	Iraq	1.82	Ethiopia	4.56	Thailand	2.34	Kazakhstan	−1.01
Russia	2.69	Georgia	1.81	Uganda	4.44	France	2.30	Yemen	−1.04
Slovakia	2.68	Ukraine	1.79	Armenia	4.32	Czech Rep.	2.29	Venezuela	−1.09
Ukraine	2.64	Lithuania	1.77	Egypt	4.27	Estonia	2.28	Libya	−1.10
Romania	2.63	Bulgaria	1.72	B. Faso	4.26	Germany	2.27	Bangladesh	−1.12
Bulgaria	2.58	Latvia	1.72	Mali	4.25	Sweden	2.22	Kyrgyzstan	−1.13
Iraq	2.57	Armenia	1.72	Georgia	4.19	Vietnam	2.20	Azerbaijan	−1.16
Lithuania	2.56	Ethiopia	1.69	Yemen	4.05	Japan	2.13	Uzbekistan	−1.16
Belarus	2.54	Albania	1.68	Bulgaria	3.98	South Korea	2.03	Nigeria	−1.18
Moldova	2.47	Moldova	1.66	Tanzania	3.77	Hong Kong	1.97	Zimbabwe	−1.20
Albania	2.43	Tanzania	1.57	Rwanda	3.72	China	1.88	Iraq	−1.37

Helliwell, J. F., Layard, R., & Sachs, J. (2013). The world happiness report. Retrieved April 29, 2016 from http://unsdsn.org/resources/publications/world-happiness-report-2013

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