Does information awareness matter for my life satisfaction? Evaluating life satisfaction through a lens of perceived air pollution: a case of Beijing, China

There is widely accepted acknowledgment that disclosing information about air pollution generally has adverse effects on an individual’s life satisfaction (LS). However, little is known about how information accessibility (IA) and public policy awareness (PA) affect LS in the real-life context and to what extent those effects are interrelated. While previous studies have suffered from a lack of a strong theoretical framework, they suggested that public scrutiny, enabled by information disclosure, assisted in reducing air pollution levels. It has been assumed that this contributed to citizens’ better perceptions of air quality, led to mitigating potential health risks from pollution, and consequently, enhanced life satisfaction. Nevertheless, much of the research up to now was based on the presumption that all individuals have access to and understand this officially-disclosed information. It often overlooks the actual availability of this information and the public's reflections on relevant policies influenced by their perception of air pollution. This research gap highlights the need for more in-depth research on the impacts of IA and PA on LS. Our study presents the first attempt to comprehensively assess the impacts of air-related information accessibility (IA) and policy awareness (PA) on the citizen’s life satisfaction (LS), especially through the lens of perceived air pollution sources (PAPS). We employ a covariance-based structural equation model (CB-SEM). Our survey, conducted in Beijing, the capital of China, collected 1900 valid samples over three months in 2022. It included questions about IA, PA, PAPS, LS, and various socio-demographic characteristics, covering two distinctive time periods: a) before the COVID-19 pandemic; b) during its normalization phase. Our findings reveal that both IA and PA significantly and positively affect LS in both periods. Moreover, the indirect parameter analysis underscores the presence of significant heterogeneity when considering the mediating role of impacts of perceived air pollutants. The results of this study offer a novel contribution to the existing research about the relationship between information accessibility, policy awareness, and life satisfaction.