The aim of this study is to explore the content of lay definitions of happiness containing food/drink and food-related terms. This research is part of CRO-WELL—the Croatian Longitudinal Study of Well-Being project—which was conducted via an online application consisting of a comprehensive battery of questionnaires related to well-being and life events. The current study uses only an open-ended question in which the respondents provide their own definition of happiness by answering the question “What is happiness for you?” Definitions containing food-related terms (N = 207) were selected for the purpose of this study. The central purpose of this research is to explore which meals/food/drink people include in these definitions, and under what circumstances. Some respondents mentioned specific types of food/drink, while others (33.3%) used generic terms such as “food,” “lunch,” or “meal.” The most frequently mentioned specific food or drink items were coffee (28%) and sweets (22.1%). Two main dimensions of values attributed to food emerged: hedonic (76.8%) -existential (18.3%) and individual (52.2%) -social (44%). The study offers an explanatory model suitable for classifying the main values of food expressed within people's subjective constructs of happiness.

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