Balance

The concept of balance has come to prominence through notions such as work-life balance. However, the broader notion of balance in life has remained under-appreciated. This may reflect the Western-centric nature of academia, with balance having received less attention in the West compared to other cultures. However, aligning with efforts to make scholarship more globally inclusive, an emergent literature is exploring this concept. This report adds to this by presenting the most ambitious study to date of life balance, as an item – “In general, how often are the various aspects of your life in balance?” – in the Global Flourishing Study, a five-year (minimum) panel study investigating the predictors of flourishing involving (in this first year) 202,898 participants from 22 countries. These results shed new light on the personal and contextual factors that shape this valued outcome, and provide the foundation for further enquiry.