Evolution in Well-being and Happiness after Increases in Consumption of Fruit and Vegetables

Redzo Mujcic and Andrew Oswald
Additional contact information
Redzo Mujcic: Faculty of Health and Behavioural Sciences, University of Queensland

The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) from University of Warwick, Department of Economics

Abstract: Objectives : To explore whether improvements in psychological well-being occur after increases in fruit and vegetable consumption.Methods : Longitudinal food diaries were examined on 12,000 randomly samples Australian adults over 2007, 2009, and 2013. The study examined fixed-effects regression equations on individuals' happiness and life satisfaction. It adjusted for a large set of other influences, including people's changing incomes and personal circumstances. Prospective analysis, Granger-causality tests, and instrumental-variable estimation were also done.Results : Increases in fruit and vegetable intake were predictive of increases in happiness and life satisfaction. Well-being improvements were of up to 0.24 life-satisfaction points (for an increase of 8 portions a day), which is equal size to the psychological gain of moving from unemployment to employment. Improvements occurred within 24 months. Conclusions : People's motivation to eat healthy food is weakened by the fact that physical-health benefits accrue decades later. This study offers a new possibility. Public-health policy could emphasise immediate well-being improvement from healthy eating. Policy Implications : Citizens could be shown longitudinal evidence that 'happiness' gains from healthy eating can occur quickly and many years before enhances physical health.

Date: 2016
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hap and nep-ltv
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (32)

Downloads: (external link)
https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/economics/research/w ... werp_1128_oswald.pdf

Related works:
Journal Article: Evolution of well-being and happiness after increases in consumption of fruit and vegetables (2016)
Working Paper: Evolution in Well-being and Happiness after Increases in Consumption of Fruit and Vegetables (2016)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wrk:warwec:1128

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) from University of Warwick, Department of Economics Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Margaret Nash ().