The seventh annual Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index State Rankings find Alaska at the pinnacle with the nation’s highest well-being ranking, followed by Hawaii in second place.

The rest of the top 10, in order, are South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, Colorado, Nebraska, Utah, New Mexico and Texas, while Kentucky and West Virginia, respectively, continued their stretch of having the lowest well-being ranking in the nation for a sixth straight year.

The Well-Being Index is created from responses contained in some 177,000 interviews done nationwide. The questions include topics such as physical health, sense of purpose, social relationships, financial security and relationship to a respondent’s community.

Alaska is the only state to have ranked in the top 10 in all five interview components. 

Hawaii and Colorado, meanwhile, are the only states to finish in the top 10 each year since 2008, according to a Gallup-Healthways announcement.

The companies will jointly release community rankings in March, and country rankings in May.

http://www.well-beingindex.com/2014-state-rankings