Perceived Macro-Labour Market Opportunities and Subjective Well-Being Natural Field Experiments in Spain and the United States

This article examines the effect of individuals’ perceived macro-labour market opportunities on their subjective well-being and the role of culture therein. Relying on affect valuation theory and socio-cultural psychology, we put forward theoretical arguments and predictions, that individuals’ perceptions of labour market opportunities can differ from objective labour market opportunities due to cultural cognitive biases which, in turn, will influence subjective well-being. Our focus is on the individualist-collectivist cultural dimensions, which are captured by selecting Spain, a collectivist society, and the United States, an individualist society, for our analysis. We conducted two harmonized natural field experiments with native undergraduate students in a Spanish public university and in an American public university. The main findings show that in the collectivist Spain only positive perceptions have an effect and increase subjective well-being, while in the individualist U.S. only negative perceptions affect subjective well-being and do so detrimentally. Overall, the results reveal that even a subtle (experimentally induced) positive or negative change of frame in perceptions seems to challenge individuals pre-established cultural ideals on the existence of labour market opportunities, and has a significant impact on their subjective well-being