Cummins, R. A., Eckersley, R., Lo, S. K., Okerstrom, E. & Davern, M. 2002, The wellbeing of Australians - 1. Work and Leisure, 2. The impact of September 11 one year later, Australian Unity Wellbeing Index Report #4.0, September, Australian Centre on Quality of Life, Deakin University, Melbourne, http://acqol.deakin.edu.au

Volunteers stand out from other workers in having the highest levels of wellbeing. Mostly aged over 55, they enjoy high levels of satisfaction with their lives, work and leisure, health, sense of community connection and religion or spirituality.

This is one of the key findings of the fourth survey of the Australian Unity Wellbeing Index, based on telephone interviews with more than 2,000 adult Australians in August 2002. The Index consists of two main values: the Personal Wellbeing Index (PWI), which is the average level of satisfaction with seven aspects (or domains) of people's personal lives; and the National Wellbeing Index (NWI), the average level of satisfaction with six aspects of national life. The values are expressed as a percentage of the maximum possible score, so representing varying degrees of satisfaction (not the proportion satisfied).

Overall, Australians' satisfaction with personal and national life fell slightly in August - the PWI by 0.8 percentage points to 74.4% and the NWI by 0.5 percentage points to 60.2% - after rises in September 2001 and March 2002. The rise in wellbeing was attributed to the September 11 terrorist attacks in America, which may have made people appreciate life more (while also saddening them); this effect may now be dissipating.

The fourth survey focused on work and leisure and included additional questions on what people considered to be their main area of work, how many hours a week they spent on this work, their satisfaction with their work and the hours they worked, and their satisfaction with the amount of leisure time they had and how they spent it. People were moderately satisfied with their area of main work (74.3%) and how they spent their leisure (71%), but less so with their work hours (68.9%) and amount of leisure time (66.7%).

The five work categories were: paid employment, family and household care, voluntary work, study and no work. The survey found that those in voluntary work - 6.5% of the sample - were mostly aged over 55, more likely to be female, and worked for 20 hours or less a week. They had the highest PWI (77.4%), and scored highest in satisfaction with life as a whole (80.5%), standard of living (78.9%), achievements in life (78%), community connectedness (79.9%) and religion or spirituality (79.7%). They also scored significantly higher than other groups in satisfaction with work (85.1%) and work hours (82.5%), and how they spent their leisure (79.4%). They were more satisfied with their health than the other predominantly older category, those who did no work (74.1% vs 65.2%).

The survey does not show the direction of cause and effect: whether volunteers are more satisfied because they do voluntary work; they do voluntary work because they have higher wellbeing; or the personal qualities that promote wellbeing also make it more likely they will do voluntary work. All three factors are likely to be involved in the associations.

Among the other work-related findings:

• Those in paid employment - 51.5% of the sample - were fairly evenly split between those who worked 40 hours or less (52%) and over 41 hours (48%), and were mostly aged 26-55. Overall, their PWI was 75.1%, but they had the lowest satisfaction with work (72.5%), leisure quality (68.5%) and leisure time (61.4%). Satisfaction with work hours was 68.9%, similar to that of students.

• Those in family care - 17.5% of the sample - were mainly women, aged between 26 and 75 (with a peak in the 36-45 age group), and often worked very long hours (almost half said they worked over 60 hours a week). Nevertheless, they had a reasonable PWI (74.9%) and the most satisfaction with their personal relationships (83.5%). Satisfaction with work was 75.1%, work hours 69.4%, leisure quality 70.3% and leisure time 65.1%.

• Students - 6.5% of the sample - were mostly aged 18-25, and almost two-thirds (62%) worked 20 hours or less. Their PWI was lower (73%) and, characteristic of this age group, they showed a low level of satisfaction with their community connection (62.7%). Satisfaction with work was 75.5%, work hours 68.7%, leisure quality 71.4%, and leisure time 69.8%.

• The 'no work' group - 18% of the sample - was mainly aged over 55 and presumably comprised people who were retired, disabled or unemployed. They had the lowest PWI of 72.5% and the lowest satisfaction with their health (65.2%). Compared with volunteers, they had a similar level of satisfaction with their leisure time (80.4%), but a lower level of satisfaction with leisure quality (74.3%).

• Work hours had little impact on overall wellbeing, but those working 20 hours or less and over 60 hours showed higher satisfaction with work, and those working 41-60 hours less satisfaction with work hours. Longer work hours also impacted on satisfaction with leisure, especially leisure time.

• Those aged 26-55 were much less satisfied with work and leisure than both younger and older people, probably reflecting the work and family pressures experienced by this age group. This was especially so for satisfaction with work hours, where the scores ranged from 65.2% (age 26-35) to 81% (66-75), and leisure time, where scores ranged from 57.9% (26-35) to 84.5% (66-75).

Other key findings from the latest survey were:

• The proportion of people who said they felt saddened now by the September 11 terrorist attacks fell to 50% from 90.4% in September 2001 and 62.7% in March 2002. However, for those affected, the intensity of the distress had not declined.

• The September attacks also appear to have affected people's experience of recent happy and sad events in their lives: they are experiencing fewer happy events and are now more likely to report a sad event than a happy one; and sad events (but not happy ones) are now experienced with more intensity.

• Satisfaction with standard of living fell 1.2 percentage points and that with financial security 2.6 percentage points in August compared to March, reflecting the poor performance of investment funds and stock markets.

• Satisfaction with government, while up slightly (0.5 percentage points to 53.3%), remained low, suggesting continuing disaffection with government since March 2002, when it fell almost six percentage points from the September 2001 level - its stocks probably boosted then by the terrorist attacks.

• Ethnicity - surveyed for the first time for the Australian Unity Wellbeing Index - revealed few differences in wellbeing. There were no significant differences between those born in Australia, in other mainly English-speaking countries and in non-English-speaking countries for the PWI, personal domains, work, leisure quality, the effects of September 11 and life events. However, those born in non-English-speaking countries did show higher satisfaction with life in Australia than those born in Australia - NWI = 63.8% vs 59.9% - and with the national domains of environment, social conditions and national security.

• Asked about ethnic origins as well as country of birth, only 53% of those born in Australia regarded their ethnic origin as Australian.