Measuring College Campus Well-Being with Multidimensional Indices: Sustainability of Higher Education in Taiwan

Abstract

Understanding students’ subjective perceptions of universities is one of the main issues that needs to be addressed in order to improve aspects such as student retention and achieve sustainable development. Considering subjective well-being as an alternative term for happiness and satisfaction in higher education for sustainability, this study is to develop a measure conceptually and operationally for college campus well-being (CWB) with multiple dimensions, including a psychological, physical, financial, and social dimension of well-being. Subjected to factorial validity and composite reliability, the CWB scale validated by 2793 undergraduate students in central Taiwan was administered. The research demonstrates the appropriate construct validity and suitable-fit indices of the CWB multidimensional scale when used for measuring university-oriented happiness and sustainability in this research context. Differential effects were found among the colleges and between genders. The implications and future research lines are discussed.