Adolescent flourishing in South Africa

Abstract

The measurement of flourishing as an indicator of social progress has gained global recognition as a priority for governments. Adolescents, in particular, have been empirically identified as a population requiring more focused research on flourishing. In South Africa, understanding adolescent flourishing is especially critical given the country’s unique socio-cultural, economic, and historical context. This study examines flourishing among a sample of adolescents in the Western Cape Province of South Africa. We used data from a provincial survey on children’s well-being, which included a sample of 1045 adolescents between the ages of 13–19. We conceptualised flourishing as comprising both hedonic (feeling well) and eudaimonic (functioning well) components, including positive and negative affect, measured using four scales. Our analysis comprised a structural validation of the scales and measurement invariance testing across age and gender. We also report on the level of flourishing using mean scores and the percentage of scale maximum statistic. The results demonstrated appropriate fit for all the scales, with scalar measurement invariance tenable for all the scales across age and gender. The findings reveal generally high levels of well-being, though disparities in context-free life satisfaction and variations across demographic groups, highlighting the need for contextually-grounded assessments of adolescent flourishing. Overall, the study found high scores of flourishing, which is somewhat inconsistent with the objective realities experienced by adolescents in various contexts in South Africa.