Romanian children, among the happiest in the world. Where do other happy children live?

53,000 children aged 10 to 12 from 15 countries were asked about their experiences and views about their lives, according to Agepres.

Children in Turkey, Romania and Colombia are very happy, while those from South Korea and South Africa rank at the bottom, reveals a recent study.

According to the Jacobs Foundation that has funded this ongoing international project over the past three years, children in European countries tend to report higher levels of satisfaction with their friendships while children in African countries tend to be happier with their school lives. Children in northern European countries are particularly dissatisfied with their appearance and self-confidence. Most of the 50,000 children in the 15 countries rated their satisfaction with life as a whole (on a scale from zero to ten) positively, but the percentage of children with very high well-being (10 out of 10) varied from around 78 percent in Turkey and 77 percent in Romania and Colombia to around 40 percent in South Korea. The percentage with low well-being (less than 5 out of 10) varied from less than 2 percent in Romania and Colombia to over 7 percent in South Korea and South Africa.

Participants in the study were questioned on several aspects of their lives: family, time spent at home, friendships, school, money, material goods, etc.

Overall happiness did not vary between girls and boys, yet there were significant gender differences in satisfaction with oneself (body, appearance and self-confidence) in Europe and South Korea.

Moreover, over three-quarters (77 percent) of children in Norway said that they knew what rights children had compared to 36 percent in England. 84 percent of children in Norway agreed that adults generally respected children’s rights in their country compared to less than 50 percent in seven countries.