Dianne Vella-Brodrick

University of Melbourne | MSD · Melbourne Graduate School for Education

Emotion regulation (ER) becomes increasingly important across adolescent development, and promotes psychological flexibility, resilience and well-being in youth. Positive education programs (PEPs) combine academic training with positive psychology interventions (PPIs) to increase well-being and reduce mental ill-health. Despite considerable overlap...

Belonging is an essential aspect of psychological functioning. Schools offer unique opportunities to improve belonging for school-aged children. Research on school belonging, however, has been fragmented and diluted by inconsistency in the use of terminology. To resolve some of these inconsistencies, the current study uses meta-analysis of individu...

Purpose: The vision or mission statement of a school outlines the school’s purpose and defines the context, goals, and aspirations that govern the institution. Using vision and mission statements, the present descriptive research study investigated trends in Australian secondary schools’ priorities. Research Methods: A stratified sample of secondar...

Although positive psychology was initially conceived as more a shift in perspective (towards the “positive”) than a new field per se, in pragmatic terms, it is arguably beginning to function as a distinct discipline, with people self-identifying as “positive psychologists.” Thus, this conversation hour explores whether it is time for the field to s...

School vision and mission statements are an explicit indication of a school's priorities. Research has found academic motivation, mental health promotion, and school belonging to be the most frequently cited themes in these statements. The present study sought to examine whether these themes relate to student academic achievement, as indicated by N...

Positive education (PosEd) combines the concepts and scholarship of positive psychology (PP) with best practice guidelines from education to promote student flourishing within educational settings. In this chapter, we first review the conceptual approaches to well-being upon which much of PosEd in Australia is based. Second, based on our experience...

The literature on school belonging is not well advanced in Australia and is complicated by a disparity in terminology (e.g., school belonging has been referred to as school connectedness, school bonding, affiliation with school, school community). Nevertheless, there is a common understanding that school belonging is vital and necessary for the soc...

This paper argues that psychological and social functioning is fundamentally complex, and that this complexity is critical to understanding how lasting positive changes can be achieved. Principles from complex systems theory are integrated into an empirical positive psychological framework to propose a domain-based systems model of positive change...

Physiological measures provide a useful complement to self-report indices of mental health and well-being. The cortisol awakening response (CAR) has been associated with mental distress, but less consistently so with positive functioning. In this study, the utility of two CAR indices as a measure of the full spectrum of mental health and well-being...

he 15th Australian Psychological Society Psychology of Relationships Interest Group (APS-PORIG) National Conference

Fostering School Belonging in Secondary School Settings poster for the Australian Association for Research in Education (AARE) Conference 2016, Melbourne.

The aim in this chapter is to outline the broad characteristics of a good life and to underscore the importance of a multi-faceted well-being framework which accurately represents how the good life is typically played out in the real world. An overview of some core positive psychology interventions designed to achieve hedonic and eudaimonic well-be...

Growing evidence indicates that gratefulness and gratitude are important for well-being and happiness. Yet, research to date has been hindered by a lack of conceptual clarity into the nature of these constructs. The present paper reviews existing literature and argues for a distinction between gratefulness and gratitude. While both gratefulness and...

In 2016, almost three and a half billion people, or 46 % of the world population, have an internet connection (internetlivestats 2016). The number of mobile phone users is even higher: more than four and a half billion people own a mobile (or smart) phone (statista.com 2016). Interactive technology is ubiquitous, influencing the daily practices of...

Aim During the key periods of adolescence and emerging adulthood, individuals can be particularly vulnerable to experiencing sub-optimal functioning and wellbeing (AIHW, 2011). With potential long-term impacts on adult trajectories, early wellbeing promotion is critical. This study aimed to further understand wellbeing development across adolescenc...

School belonging, at both a school and university level, has been well documented as a predictor of academic and psychosocial success. The construct has been examined by scholars in a variety of different professional disciplines (e.g., education, psychology, sociology) and continues to be consistently researched. Although significant contributions...

Aim During the key periods of adolescence and emerging adulthood, individuals can be particularly vulnerable to experiencing sub-optimal functioning and wellbeing (AIHW, 2011). With potential long-term impacts on adult trajectories, early wellbeing promotion is critical. This study aimed to further understand wellbeing development across adolescenc...

The benefits of belonging and feeling connected to school for adolescent mental health and wellbeing are well documented, but how belonging is fostered is less understood. The present article puts forward a new conceptual framework of school belonging based on Bronfenbrenner's (1979) sociological model of human development, using evidence from a ra...

Studies have found that job crafting and employee well-being are correlated. Less is known, however, about the contextual variables that support or thwart job crafting within an organization. The present study examined perceived autonomy support as one such contextual factor. Working adults (N = 250) completed a battery of measures on autonomy supp...

Dispositional mindfulness has been associated with a range of adaptive psychological and functional outcomes across the lifespan. Despite the recognised adaptive qualities of dispositional mindfulness, the developmental precursors of this trait are much less understood. This study examined the relationship between environmental and individual facto...

This study explored the relationship between transport independence and autonomy among young people. A sample of 543 participants aged between 17 and 25 years (M = 21.5, SD = 2.4) completed an online survey asking about well-being, psychological autonomy, transport independence and transport disadvantage. It was predicted that transport independenc...

Emerging adulthood (EA) is a key developmental stage of diversification and exploration, when individuals can be vulnerable to mental illness and sub-optimal mental health. Mental health during EA can promote positive trajectories into adulthood. Studies have implicated a range of individual and environmental factors in the promotion of well-being...

Background Growing evidence is linking gratitude with well-being, yet insufficient scholarly attention has been given to how it is defined, understood and measured. To address this issue, gratitude and gratefulness can be usefully distinguished as two types of appreciative functioning. Applying complex dynamic systems theory, appreciative functioni...

In this chapter, it is argued that there is scope for enhancing well-being through intentional activities. The efficacy and practical utility of some of the most commonly used positive interventions to enhance well-being are reviewed. A number of individual and contextual factors and how these fit with well-being activities are also identified base...

Empirical research on employee job crafting is scarce, probably because until recently scales with which the construct can be reliably and validly measured were not available. Although a general scale has recently been developed, the cognitive component of job crafting was omitted. The aim of the present study was to address this gap by developing...

In this chapter, we look at positive employee health and well-being and why organizations should invest in comprehensive employee well-being programs. We explore the practical steps needed to move from nonmalfeasance (to do “no harm” to employees) to employee beneficence (to “do good” to employees), using an applied ethics perspective. We draw on t...

Purpose — This chapter presents various conceptualisations of well-being, which focus on the full breadth of hedonic and eudaimonic qualities. A case has been made for why scholars with an interest in transport mobility and transport policy should consider the use of well-being as a valuable outcome measure to complement the standard economy-based...