• Happy and confident
  • Life satisfaction
  • Self confidence
  • Body image
  • Sense of belonging
  • Speakers of te reo maori
  • First language retention
• Supportive relationships
• Healthy
• Education and training
• Meaningful employment
• Economically secure
• Recreation and leisure
• Safe
• Active citizens

Happy and confident

Desired outcome

Young people are happy and confident, feeling positive and comfortable with their own identity and facing the future with a sense of self-efficacy.

Relevance

Adolescence and young adulthood is a critical time for developing skills and behaviours that help to determine future success in terms of educational qualifications, job prospects and the formation of meaningful relationships with others. 

Young people face a number of decisions that can affect their long-term development and wellbeing.  Having self-belief and a sense of control over their lives influences their life-choices and plans for the future. 

Culture and a sense of belonging are an integral part of self-identity.

Happiness is a core aspect of personal wellbeing.  Studies show that when people are happy they also tend to be more pleasant to be around, more creative and may even live longer.(1) 

Feeling happy, confident and positive about themselves and their own abilities improves young people’s willingness to try new things and to persist in the face of setbacks. 

Indicators

The indicators selected for this domain provide a ‘snapshot’ of young people’s satisfaction with their lives and confidence in their own identity.  Only one of the indicators, the proportion of young Māori that are able to speak te reo Māori (the Māori language), is able to provide any information about trends over time.

The first indicator measures young people’s life satisfaction, which is associated with overall quality of life. 

The second and third indicators focus on young people of school age.  The second indicator reports on confidence and positivity about self, and the third focuses on a specific area of this - body image.  The fourth indicator measures the extent to which young people feel like outsiders or out of place within school settings. 

The fifth and sixth indicators provide information about one aspect of cultural identity.  For Māori, an ability to speak Māori is a necessary skill for full participation in Māori society.  For other ethnic groups, language retention is an important indicator of the extent to which people are able to engage with their culture and pass this on to future generations.

Use the links on the left to explore the indicators in this domain.

Notes

1. Donovan, N. and Halpern, D with Sargeant R. (2002) Life Satisfaction: State of Knowledge and Implications for Government, Strategy Unit, London.