QUALITY OF LIFE AND WELL-BEING: OBJECTIVE, SUBJECTIVE AND AGENTIC ASPECTS

The article is devoted to methodological and theoretical aspects of quality of life as an interdisciplinary category in relation to the concepts of well-being and subjective well-being from the perspective of distinction between objective, subjective and agentic factors in evaluating one's own life. The quality of life is defined by an objective and relatively invariant (for large social groups) way of living, setting objective conditions for meeting the basic needs of individuals within the framework of this way of living. Subjective well-being is defined by self-evaluation of individual's life, determined, beyond and above the conditions of meeting the basic needs, also by the satisfaction of individually-specific needs within the framework of a chosen or constructed lifestyle, as well as by the perception of the field of possibilities and subjective criteria of life evaluation. The concept of well-being covers both the quality of life and subjective well-being. Finally, the concept of happiness partially intersects with the concept of subjective well-being, partly goes beyond it, in particular when it comes to self-determined happiness created by the subject himself and least dependent on external conditions (eudaimonia, meaning, flow experience, etc.). The proposed conceptual framework can be helpful for structuring research problems and hypotheses in this interdisciplinary field.