Global Flourishing Study Releases Largest Dataset On Human Well-being

Apr 8 2026

The Global Flourishing Study (GFS), nan astir broad empirical investigation of quality flourishing ever undertaken, coming made its first 2 waves of information publically disposable done nan Center for Open Science astatine nary costs and without pre-registration. Researchers, journalists, policymakers and nan nationalist tin now freely entree nan dataset connected nan Open Science Framework (OSF) website.

The merchandise marks a important milestone for a study that has already produced much than 100 peer-reviewed publications, including a typical Nature Portfolio postulation of 35 different studies utilizing conscionable nan first activity of GFS information alone.

"We built this study because we believed nan world needed a rigorous, shared connection for what makes life spell well," said Byron R. Johnson, Ph.D., Distinguished Professor of nan Social Sciences astatine Baylor University and co-director of nan GFS. "Today we're putting nan grounds successful everyone's hands."

Co-directed by Johnson and Tyler VanderWeele, Ph.D., of Harvard University and fielded successful business pinch Gallup and nan Center for Open Science, nan GFS tracks astir 200,000 participants crossed 22 countries and 1 territory, measuring flourishing crossed six domains:

1. Happiness and life satisfaction,
2. Physical and intelligence health,
3. Meaning and purpose,
4. Character and virtue,
5. Close societal relationships, and
6. Financial and worldly stability.

Because nan aforesaid participants are surveyed crossed aggregate waves, nan study moves beyond relationship toward nan kinds of causal questions that cross-sectional investigation cannot address.

What nan information has already revealed

• Young group are struggling. Global information reveals a striking reversal: Young adults now study little well-being than older populations, signaling an urgent request for further knowing of younker flourishing.
• The improvement paradox. The study exposes a captious hostility astatine nan bosom of economical progress: There is simply a antagonistic narration betwixt a nation's wealthiness and its citizens' reported consciousness of meaning and purpose.
• Faith communities support flourishing. Across divers cultures, belief information is among nan strongest predictors of well-being – suggesting that religion communities cultivate thing basal to quality thriving that merits superior attraction from researchers and policymakers alike.

Accessing nan data

Data from Waves 1 and 2, on pinch accompanying instructions and archiving from Gallup, are now available. The dataset is unfastened for wide use; entree to a mini number of delicate variables continues to require Institutional Review Board approval. Researchers who pre-register their study and study plans done the Global Flourishing Registry will besides summation entree to Wave 3, nan study's astir caller information collection.

The mobility is nary longer whether flourishing tin beryllium measured. It's what we do pinch what we've found."

Tyler VanderWeele, Ph.D., of Harvard University