INVEST – Longitudinal study on wellbeing
We study the well-being and opinions of people living in Finland about the functioning of society.
What factors should influence how we fare in life? How should the state support its citizens? How do you perceive your own health and financial situation?
Ageing, rapid urbanisation, digitalisation, labour shortages and many other ongoing changes
have challenged the Finnish welfare state. In order to transform society in a functional way
and to improve welfare on a broad scale, we need information about the views and
experiences of people living in Finland.
We conduct a comprehensive survey on the respondents’ welfare and social commitment. We
ask questions on their attitudes and opinions about how society works. In the first phase of
the survey, we want to know what factors influence success in life and how functional and
necessary the various public services and benefits feel to the respondents. We complete the
survey data with comprehensive register data.
The survey is expected to promote an understanding of how the state should support its
citizens and what factors should influence how individuals live their lives. It offers new
perspectives on relations between inequality, social mobility and social attitudes. The results
of the survey help us develop policy measures and intervention programmes to improve the
welfare of people living in Finland throughout their life cycle.
Survey
More than 16,000 people aged 18–80 living in Finland in 2024 have been invited to
participate in the first phase of the survey. The invited persons have been selected from the
population register of the Digital and Population Data Services Agency using random
sampling. The comprehensive random sample represents the whole of Finland in terms of
structure, socio-economic background and geographical areas.
What is the study about?
INVEST Inequalities, Interventions and New Welfare State
The survey is being conducted at INVEST, which is a joint research centre and flagship of the University of Turku and the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare for inequality,
interventions and the new welfare society. Our goal is to create a more equitable, proactive and economically and socially sustainable welfare state model for Finland.
