Synergistic impacts of technological advancement and environmental hazards on social change and human well-being in South Asia

Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the challenges in attaining these goals are always an eye-catching research theme for academics, politicians, and stakeholders around the world. Subjective well-being (SWB) is one of the central SDGs but is under-researched so far. Addressing this concern is crucial to maintaining societal welfare and promoting the realization of a sustainable future. Hence, this study explores the determinants of SWB with a particular focus on technological advancement and environmental damage. The paper examines SWB determinants in six South Asian nations from 2005 to 2022 using the cross-sectional augmented auto-regressive distributed lag model. The conclusions demonstrated that technology advancement improved SWB in the long term. Meanwhile, environmental deterioration has no appreciable short-term effects and harms SWB in the long term. This study adds to the field by examining how technological advancement and environmental deterioration explain SWB in South Asian economies. The study recommends policies that aim at improving innovations and reducing CO₂ emissions.