There's three concerns I have about this, the Cantri measure as it's applied.
One is that it's one question. Just one question to summarize your life.
The second is that the ends of the scale has always seemed sort of odd to me: "he top of the ladder represents the best possible life for you and the bottom of the ladder represents the worst possible life for you."
Someone who is depressed is probably going to shift a bit in their evaluations of the top and bottom. That is, someone who is visibly and diagnosably depressed will probably imagine a worse best possible life, and also maybe even worse worst possible life. So you could be pretty darn depressed and still rate yourself as moderate. If your options go from "depressing" to "unmentionable hellscape" you could still rate yourself as a 7. Are most people doing this? Maybe not, but it's an odd way to frame the question and leads itself to that.
The final concern I have is how many of these are on the phone. If someone randomly called me on the phone to ask, would I go there even if I was really depressed? Probably not.
I guess I see these results as pretty interesting but really difficult to interpret. It's like trying to gauge global ocean temperature changes from one temperature reading in your local bay.
Reddit skews young, and I’ve definitely noticed the younger generation likes to commiserate. There’s also this pervasive sense of doom that the environment and the economy is going to collapse.
There's a pervasive sense of stagnant wages, unaffordable homes, etc in first world and developing countries. In China, it's tangping. In America, it's my step sibling having 0 desire to move out of our parents home (e.g., "Millennials kill X" headlines).
Your options are to try very hard, and maybe secure a barely conventional middle class life, or not try. And for people who aren't a fit for the knowledge economy, the second is the optimal choice.
That might explain the ratings. COVID has begun a kind of shift. Those in the upper class are getting it hard. Real estate traders are screwed. Those who pay minimum wage are having difficulty hiring, especially with the number pf deaths from those exposed to it. Things like bus driving come with hefty hazard pay now.
One is that it's one question. Just one question to summarize your life.
The second is that the ends of the scale has always seemed sort of odd to me: "he top of the ladder represents the best possible life for you and the bottom of the ladder represents the worst possible life for you."
Someone who is depressed is probably going to shift a bit in their evaluations of the top and bottom. That is, someone who is visibly and diagnosably depressed will probably imagine a worse best possible life, and also maybe even worse worst possible life. So you could be pretty darn depressed and still rate yourself as moderate. If your options go from "depressing" to "unmentionable hellscape" you could still rate yourself as a 7. Are most people doing this? Maybe not, but it's an odd way to frame the question and leads itself to that.
The final concern I have is how many of these are on the phone. If someone randomly called me on the phone to ask, would I go there even if I was really depressed? Probably not.
I guess I see these results as pretty interesting but really difficult to interpret. It's like trying to gauge global ocean temperature changes from one temperature reading in your local bay.