Ideally, outcome measurements for interventions that affect wellbeing would report the standard, ONS recommended, life satisfaction question. Responses to this question directly correspond to WELLBYs, which can be monetised in policy appraisal following the UK Treasury's Green Book Supplementary Guidance. In this instance, the wellbeing impacts of a given policy are clear. However, while this form of social cost benefit analysis is still developing, measurement of life satisfaction often does not take place. In the absence of a universal wellbeing measure in policy, a host of other metrics and indices are collected, capturing similar concepts relating to wellbeing or health. To monetise wellbeing benefits in these cases, there is a need to map these indicators onto WELLBYs. This paper estimates mapping functions which translate common wellbeing measures into WELLBYs. It provides mapping functions for the General Health Questionnaire-12 (GHQ-12), Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale (WEMWBS), Short-form Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale (S-WEMWBS), Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ), Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire - Internalising Scale (SDQ-I), Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9), and Generalised Anxiety Disorder Questionnaire-7 (GAD-7).

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3 June 2025     Paper Number CEPOP70

Download PDF - Mapping Functions for Wellbeing Measures to Generate WELLBYs for Use in Economic Evaluation

This CEP occasional paper is published under the centre's Community Wellbeing programme.

This publication comes under the following theme: Targeting policy at wellbeing