A Comparison of Four Commonly Used Scales for Measuring Adolescent Life Satisfaction

This study compared the performance of four commonly used scales for measuring adolescent life satisfaction. Two hundred and seventy-five Serbian adolescents (50.2% girls, M_age = 16.64) completed Serbian versions of the Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS), the Students’ Life Satisfaction Scale (SLSS), the Brief Multidimensional Students’ Life Satisfaction Scale (BMSLSS), the Personal Wellbeing Index—School Children (PWI-SC), as well as measures of positive affect, negative affect, and externalizing behaviors. A single-factor structure of all four scales was supported in the present sample. All four scales demonstrated satisfactory internal consistency and showed evidence of both convergent and incremental validity. Life satisfaction as assessed by domain satisfaction scales (BMSLSS, PWI-SC) was better predicted by positive affect than by negative affect. In contrast, positive and negative affect had similar contributions to life satisfaction when assessed using global life satisfaction scales (SWLS, SLSS). Domain satisfaction scales had greater unique contributions in predicting externalizing behaviors compared to global life satisfaction scales. To conclude, our evidence supports all four scales as appropriate tools for assessing adolescent life satisfaction. However, we also detected some nuanced differences between the four scales.