Factor structure of the School Well-being Model

The aim of this study was to confirm empirically the factor structure of the School Well-being Model. In this Model well-being was divided into school conditions, social relationships, means for self-fulfillment and health status. Data for this study were collected by the School Health Promotion Survey in Finland with 40 147 respondents from Grades 8 and 9. The 43 variables from the Survey were fitted into the School Well-being Model using confirmatory factor analysis. The Goodness of Fit Index (GFI) for the four-factor model was 0.93 and GFI Adjusted for Degrees of Freedom was 0.93. The correlations between factors varied from 0.30 to 0.78 and internal consistencies (Cronbach’s αs) from 0.62 to 0.84. The categories school conditions and health status had a good variety of variables. However, the social relationships and the means for self-fulfillment categories would have benefited from additional questions. The School Well-being Model can be utilized to construct school well-being profiles both for groups of pupils and for schools as a whole. The school well-being profile could highlight the area or areas in which schools could make improvements in order to promote the well-being of its pupils.