PUTRAJAYA – The Malaysia Happiness Index (MHI) 2021 that was announced by Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM) resulted an overall happiness score of 6.48 in the Happy level, reported by The Star.
The study also indicates that regardless of races, genders, strata, age groups, education and marital status, Malaysians are generally happy.
This first-ever study that analysed the happiness level in the country was announced by Chief Statistician Datuk Seri Dr Mohd Uzir Mahidin, saying that he’s glad that the findings are satisfying and could served as a guide for future developmental policies.
“The study shows the concept of inclusiveness because the results are similar across the board in terms of ethnicity, gender, and strata. This makes it easy for us to plan developmental policies as the gaps are not that wide,” he said at the launch of the MHI at the Statistics Department here yesterday.
The survey about Malaysians’ happiness was conducted from September to November in 2021, the index is developed to measure the happiness level in Malaysia from physical, social, emotional, and spiritual aspects.
“Overall, Malaysians are at a happy level despite the country facing the challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic and an economic crisis in 2021, the year when the MHI Survey 2021 was conducted. This scenario may be different in future studies,” Mohd Uzir added.
The study recorded a total of 42,446 respondents, which had 73 indicators under the 13 components, which includes, family, housing and environment, social participation, health, communication facilities, education, working life, income, public safety, time use, religion and spiritual, culture and emotional experience.
Labuan is the happiest
The MHI barometer categorises happiness into 5 different groups, which are a score of 0 to 2 as Very Unhappy, 2.01 to 4 as Unhappy, 4.01 to 6 as Moderately Happy, 6.01 to 8 at Happy, and 8.01 to 10 at Very Happy.
W.P. Labuan MHI’s score is close to ‘perfect’, which is 9.29, whereas Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya scored 7.77 and 7.28 respectively, showing that Malaysians who reside in federal territories are the happiest in the country.
On the other side, Melaka and Selangor has been recorded with the lowest MHI score, which is 5.85 and 5.74 respectively, which shows that the citizens in these states were only Moderately Happy.
Other than that, the index also found that among Malaysians, married people are the happiest, with a 6.48 score. By gender, women were happier with a 0.03 higher index than men, which is 6.49.
Mohd Uzir also shared that three components with the highest score value are, the family component (7.23), religion and spiritual component (7.21), and the health component (6.75).
Measuring by educational attainment, Malaysians with tertiary education recorded the highest on the index at 6.58.
While participants of the survey with primary education are at 6.53, those with secondary education at 6.41 and those with no formal education at 6.31.
Those who lives in rural was indicated to be happier than those in urban, with a 6.54 and 6.46 score respectively.
All ethnic groups were recorded at a Happy level with a score between 6.28 and 6.50, with the Bumiputra scoring the highest and “others” the lowest.
The study also found that Malaysians who aged between 55 and 59 were the happiest, with a score of 6.51.
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Cover Image via The Star and Twitter / NewsBFM
Editor: Sarah Yeoh
