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Flourishing Scale

FS
psychologysocial sciencesFree for research use

An 8-item summary measure of perceived success in relationships, self-esteem, purpose, competence, optimism, and contribution to others' well-being.

Items
8
Response format
7-point Likert scale
Version
Original 8-item Flourishing Scale

Ready-to-cite methods sentence

Psychosocial flourishing was measured with the 8-item Flourishing Scale (Diener et al., 2010), which showed good internal consistency in the original multi-site college sample (α = .87).

Citing this in a methods section? See the APA 7 guide — Author–date citations for psychology and the social sciences. Or compare all six citation styles.

Reliability & validation

Validation population
College students across six locations (Diener et al., 2010)
Test–retest
0.71
Cronbach's α
0.87

Response anchors

Strongly disagree · Disagree · Slightly disagree · Mixed or neither agree nor disagree · Slightly agree · Agree · Strongly agree

Known limitations

The scale provides a broad summary rather than separate domain scores and is not a clinical measure. The source appeared online in 2009 and in the 2010 journal volume; cite the 2010 issue year.

Original citation

Diener, E., Wirtz, D., Tov, W., Kim-Prieto, C., Choi, D., Oishi, S., Biswas-Diener, R. (2010). New well-being measures: Short scales to assess flourishing and positive and negative feelings. Social Indicators Research, 97(2), 143-156.

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-009-9493-y

Questions researchers ask

What does the FS measure?

An 8-item summary measure of perceived success in relationships, self-esteem, purpose, competence, optimism, and contribution to others' well-being.

How many items does the FS have?

The Flourishing Scale (FS) has 8 items.

Is the FS free to use?

The FS is free to use for non-commercial academic research. You don't need to pay a license fee, but you should always cite the original publication.

Is the FS reliable?

Validation studies report Cronbach's α of 0.87, test–retest reliability of 0.71. See the reliability section for the population studied and full statistics.

Who developed the FS, and how do I cite it?

Diener, E., Wirtz, D., Tov, W., Kim-Prieto, C., Choi, D., Oishi, S., Biswas-Diener, R. (2010). New well-being measures: Short scales to assess flourishing and positive and negative feelings. Social Indicators Research, 97(2), 143-156. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-009-9493-y

Reference only

Folio has verified the citation and methods metadata for this scale, but does not hold confirmed item wording or scoring to import into Surveyor.

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Library entry verified August 2026. Metadata is provided for reference; item wording is available inside Folio Surveyor, subject to each instrument's licensing.