The Influencing Factors Of Subjective Well-being And Underlying Mechanism:a Multilevel View

Over the recent years, it has become an increasingly significant issue to cultivate psychological qualities of middle school students. Among them, subjective well-being is an essential theme to the physical and psychological health of middle school students. Researchers gradually recognized its value and undertook researches in this field. Pre-existing researches examine many factors in producing subjective well-being. However, the causal pathways leading to it and the processes of the interaction of psychological and environmental factors still remain obscure. Meanwhile, the limitations in research technique confine the researches to either individual level or class level which disable understandings on interactions of different level.Numbers of evidences suggest that there are complicated interactions among causal factors of subjective well-being from various levels. Nonetheless, the processes are to be reveal. To answer questions above, a study constituted by four parts was conducted. First, emotional intelligence scale produced by Schutte was revised to measure the emotional intelligence of middle school students; Next, Structural Equation Model was applied to examine the mechanism underlying the causal pathway between emotional intelligence and subjective well-being. Then, Hierarchical Level Model analysis was introduced to examine the cross-level moderating effect of class environment in emotional intelligence and subjective well-being. Finally, the mediating effect of emotional intelligence between socioeconomic statue and subjective well-being was examined using Hierarchical Level Model analysis.The result show that:(1) The construct of emotional intelligence scale is of second-order one-factor structure;(2) In individual level, the relation between subjective well-being and emotional intelligence were mediated by class environment;(3) In class level, the relation between emotional intelligence and subjective well-being was moderated by class environment, the positive relationship of emotional intelligence and subjective well-being was strengthen by classmates’relation;(4) Emotional intelligence played a significant mediating effect in the cross-level relationship between socioeconomic statue and subjective well-being which indicated that although socioeconomic statue has a considerable effect on subjective well-being, educators can also promote students’subjective well-being by lifting their emotional intelligence.