A Hierarchical Model of Social Change: A Personal Wellbeing Perspective

This chapter applies a hierarchical model of personal wellbeing to social change. Specifically, programs and policies of positive social change can be developed by making distinction among personal wellbeing constructs in a hierarchical fashion. Specifically, much research has been done on the antecedents and consequences personal wellbeing at six levels analysis: physiological, emotional, cognitive, meta-cognitive, developmental, and social-ecological. At the physiological level, social change can be construed as personal interventions to achieve a preponderance of neurochemicals related to positive emotions (dopamine, serotonin, etc.) relative to neurochemicals related to negative emotions (cortisol). At the emotional level, social change involves personal interventions that can result into a preponderance of positive affect (happiness, joy, etc.) relative to negative affect (anger, sadness, etc.). At the cognitive level, social change can be viewed in terms of personal interventions designed to achieve a higher-level goal: a preponderance of domain satisfaction (satisfaction in salient and multiple life domains such as family life, work life, etc.) relative to dissatisfaction in other life domains. At the meta-cognitive level, personal interventions can be developed at a more macro level but still at the individual level--a preponderance of positive evaluations about one’s life using certain standards of comparison (satisfaction with one’s life compared to one’s past life, the life of family members, etc.) relative to negative evaluations about one’s life using similar or other standards of comparison. Climbing up one more notch up the hierarchical ladder, we have personal interventions at the developmental level. In this case, the goal is to achieve a preponderance of positive psychological traits (self-acceptance, personal growth, etc.) relative to negative psychological traits (pessimism, hopelessness, etc.). At the most macro level (social-ecological), personal interventions focus on achieving a preponderance of perceived social resources (social acceptance, social actualization, etc.) relative to perceived social constraints (social exclusion, ostracism, etc.).