The Association Between Adolescent Life Satisfaction, Family Structure, Family Affluence and Gender Differences in Parent–Child Communication Kate Ann Levin • Lorenza Dallago • Candace Currie Accepted: 29 January 2011 / Published online: 12 February 2011 Ó Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011 Abstract The study sought to examine young people’s life satisfaction in the context of the family environment, using data from the 2006 HBSC: WHO-collaborative Study in Scotland (N = 5,126). Multilevel linear regression analyses were carried out for 11-, 13- and 15-year old boys and girls, with outcome measure ridit-transformed life satisfaction. The study found there to be a relationship between family structure and life satisfaction for boys and girls aged 13 and 15 years. Family affluence mediated this relationship, however the extent of this mediation depended both on age and gender. For both boys and girls at all ages, life satis- faction was more strongly associated with parent–child communication than with family structure or family affluence. After adjustment for risk/health behaviours and attitudes towards peers and school, family structure remained significant for boys aged 13 years only. Whereas difficult parent–child communication acted as a risk factor of low life satisfaction for boys and girls, easy communication acted as protective factor among girls only. Keywords Life satisfaction Á Adolescence Á Parent–child communication Á Family structure Á Family affluence 1 Introduction The World Health Organisation recommends the promotion of mental well-being for all (WHO 2005), where mental well-being is defined as the positive component of mental health. This is not merely the absence of mental disorders. Mental well-being, also known as positive mental health, can be separated into two streams, the eudaimonic stream, the way in which people function in life, and the hedonic stream, the way in which they perceive their life (Keyes 2006). Life satisfaction, a measure of hedonic well-being, is a global judgement of one’s life. It is commonly used as an indicator of well-being among K. A. Levin (&) Á C. Currie University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK e-mail: kate.levin@ed.ac.uk L. Dallago University of Padua, Padua, Italy 123 Soc Indic Res (2012) 106:287–305 DOI 10.1007/s11205-011-9804-y