Classnotes 26th January 2007: New topic: Unit 3People and Place

Key questions: What is quality of life? What is standard of living?

Key terms
There are two key terms that we will refer to during the rest of the course:

Quality of life - the happiness, well-being and satisfaction of a person. Among the many factors that influence quality of life are the person's family, income and access to services.
Standard of living - those factors which affect a person's quality of life and can be measured. Many measures of a person's standard of living are to do with possessions.

In other words, QoL is about a person's opinion of how they enjoy their life.
SoL is about how much they have.


Measuring QoL and SoL
They are measured in different ways:

QoL is measured using: Qualitative data – data that depends on your viewpoint – e.g. someone’s opinion of how visually appealing an area is. You find out by asking people.

SoL is meausured using: Quantitative data – factual data that can be given in numbers e.g. the % of houses with central heating, or the amount of crime. You find out by using data like the census.

ALERT!
Quality of life depends on personal opinion. It might be different for different people.
SoL is about a factual count of how much the person has - do they have an indoor toilet, a car, five bedrooms etc.