Mediator role of innovation in the relationship between social development and happiness

Abstract

Governments, organizations, and researchers discuss the policies necessary for people and societies to lead a happy life in the 21st century as a critical issue. Although researchers expect a positive relationship between the happiness levels of communities and their social development levels, it is necessary to question the direction, the strength of this relationship and the existence of different variables affecting it. In this context, in this study, we aimed to examine the relationships among societies’ development level, happiness level, and innovation capacity. For this purpose, we obtained 2020 data from global reports covering the social development, innovation, and happiness variables of 119 countries. We tested the research model within the framework of these data and hierarchical regression analysis, and we found that innovation partially mediates the relationship between the social development levels of countries and happiness. Research results show that innovation is an intellectual and industrial process that positively affects the happiness of societies