Island residents the happiest, most satisfied and least anxious in UK

Residents in the islands are the happiest, most satisfied and least anxious in the UK.

The first annual results of David Cameron’s so-called happiness index were released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) on Tuesday.

Participants were asked how worthwhile they found their activities, their level of life satisfaction, how happy they are and how anxious they are.

The Western Isles, Orkney and Shetland scored the best in each category.

When asked how worthwhile their lives are, residents scored an average of 8.2 out of ten. When asked how happy they are, the average is eight out of ten. Life satisfaction was an average of 8.1.

Anxiety levels are low among the islands, with an average score of 2.5 out of ten.

The figures come from the first Integrated Household Survey of 200,000 people aged 16 and over between April 2011 and March 2012.

The map below shows how happiness varies throughout the country. Areas coloured yellow and light green are the areas where large proportions of people give high happiness scores.

The survey was conducted as part of the Prime Minister's initiative, launched in 2010, to assess the wellbeing of the nation alongside economic data like GDP.

Glenn Everett, ONS programme director for the Measuring National Well-being Programme, said: "By examining and analysing both objective statistics as well as subjective information, a more complete picture of national wellbeing can be formed.

"Understanding people's views of wellbeing is an important addition to existing official statistics and has potential uses in the policy making process and to aid other decision making."

Mr Cameron has described the programme to measure the UK's sense of well-being as crucial to finding out what the Government can do to "really improve lives".

The ONS work has been given a budget of £2m a year until 2014/15, to cover the cost of staffing and field work.

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