Gallup Ranks ‘Suffering’ in Armenia Second Highest in the World

Homeless people in Gyumri in December of 1988, in the aftermath of the Spitak earthquake that devastated the region

YEREVAN (Arka)—A Gallup survey revealed that 37 percent of Armenians rated their lives poorly enough to be considered “suffering.”

The list of “suffering” nations was topped for the third year in a row by Bulgaria with 39% of Bulgarians rating their lives as “suffering.” Following closely were Cambodia, Haiti, Hungary, Macedonia and Iran, where more than 30 percent of adults rated their conditions poorly.

Gallup classifies respondents as “thriving,” “struggling,” or “suffering” based on how they rate their current and future lives on a scale of zero to ten based on the Cantril Self-Anchoring Striving Scale. The Princeton, New Jersey, polling agency said it considers people to be suffering if they rate their current lives a 4 or lower and their lives in five years a 4 or lower.

In 20 out of 143 countries and areas surveyed in 2012, at least a quarter of the adult population rated their lives low enough to be considered suffering, Gallup said. Worldwide, one in seven adults was suffering in 2012, results indicated.

Suffering was 2 percent or less in 17 countries and areas, which Gallup said tended to be wealthier and more developed, including Iceland, Qatar, Sweden, Norway, United  Arab Emirates and Nigeria.

Four percent of Americans ranked themselves low enough to be considered suffering in 2012.

Results are based on telephone and face-to-face interviews with about 1,000 adults per country. For results based on the total sample of national adults, the margin of error ranged from 1.7 percentage points to 5.6 percentage points.