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Abstract
A comprehensive overview of the field and its future trajectories is needed to gain insight into how psychological research on well-being has progressed over time and what needs to be addressed. Previous reviews on well-being tend to have limited scope or contain subjective inferences about the state of research on well-being, resulting in fragmented insights and a lack of a comprehensive view of the research on well-being. To address this limitation, we used bibliometric methods to map the intellectual structure of the entire field of well-being science and provide a more comprehensive view of the research. We used a database of over 30,000 primary documents downloaded from Web of Science and leveraged three bibliometric methods: historiography, document co-citation analysis, and bibliographic coupling. The findings shed light on the (1) evolution of well-being science over time, (2) the underlying structure of the intellectual field and its current state, and (3) the future trajectory of the field and emerging topics. Based on our findings, we provide three future directions for well-being science: (i) embracing diversity and broadening the scope of well-being scholarship, (ii) transcending beyond dichotomous perspectives of well-being, and (iii) harnessing advanced methods and measures for a stronger scientific foundation. By offering objective insights and interpretations derived from multiple analyses of well-being research, this paper serves as a valuable resource for researchers, policymakers, and practitioners. It provides guidance and direction in addressing the challenges related to defining, measuring, and advancing our understanding of well-being, fostering progress in the field.
We introduce a theoretical framework for conceptualizing Psychological Well‐Being (PWB) as a process that unfolds over short and longer time‐scales. We argue that this framework can be especially useful for studying the change mechanisms in PWB within the context of mobile Health (mHealth) interventions. Four lines of research are considered within this framework to inform the scientific exploration of PWB in the context of mHealth interventions. First, we explore key dynamic characteristics of change in PWB functioning. Second, we discuss PWB intervention response as a learning process (i.e., meaningful and transformational changes in state), reflected as change in key dynamic characteristics of PWB. Third, we explain mechanisms of change in PWB intervention practices through an underlying process of skill development. Fourth, we discuss intervention response heterogeneity within this framework. The approach we outline is intended to articulate currently unanswered, process‐oriented research questions about PWB interventions, how they work, and a methodological path forward for exploring them.
Age differences in emotional experience over the adult life span were explored, focusing on the frequency, intensity, complexity, and consistency of emotional experience in everyday life. One hundred eighty-four people, age 18 to 94 years, participated in an experience-sampling procedure in which emotions were recorded across a 1-week period. Age was unrelated to frequency of positive emotional experience. A curvilinear relationship best characterized negative emotional experience. Negative emotions declined in frequency until approximately age 60, at which point the decline ceased. Individual factor analyses computed for each participant revealed that age was associated with more differentiated emotional experience. In addition, periods of highly positive emotional experience were more likely to endure among older people and periods of highly negative emotional experience were less stable. Findings are interpreted within the theoretical framework of socioemotional selectivity theory.
The effect of age on happiness, as defined by positive and negative affect, was examined in a survey of 2,727 persons of a broad age range (25–74) conducted by the MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Successful Midlife Development. The age–affect association was examined, controlling for a host of sociodemographic, personality, and contextual influences. Among women, age was related to positive affect nonlinearly but was unrelated to negative affect. Among men, age interacted with 2 key variables in predicting affect: extraversion and marital status. These findings lend support to recent life span theories of emotion and indicate that personality, contextual, and sociodemographic variables, as well as their interactions, are all needed to fully understand the age–affect relationship.
While positive psychology has been in development for more than 20 years, positive psychologists still face the challenge of finding optimal measurements of well-being. The PERMA framework provides a new understanding of well-being based on years of research. However, whether it adds value in terms of being distinct from the already established measures of Subjective Well-Being (SWB) has recently been under debate. Certain characteristics of PERMA make it unsuited for traditional factor analysis and data analysis techniques. In this paper, we argue that a network approach is more suitable for understanding the interrelated nature of PERMA components. We then show how the components of PERMA and SWB are distinct using exploratory graphical analysis. Our results show that while PERMA predicts SWB, PERMA provides us a more nuanced way to understand the interrelated antecedents of well-being, which we refer to as the web of well-being.
It is widely acknowledged that social relationships unfold across multiple time-scales. For example, social interactions that take place over moments, hours, or days also shape relationship change and outcomes over months, years, and even decades. These processes likely unfold in the reverse direction as well: experiences over longer-term timeframes may shape how people interact on a moment-to-moment basis. The increasing availability of intensive longitudinal data and measurement burst designs, as well as creativity in the contexts and modes of data collection--including social media, text messages, and event-contingent sampling--have exploded the possibilities for advancing knowledge on social relationships across multiple time-scales. The aim of this issue is to forward methodological innovations, empirical findings, and future directions in relationship science through the study of social and personal relationships across multiple time-scales.
The purpose of this systematic literature review was to explore the current critiques and criticisms of positive psychology and to provide a consolidated view of the main challenges facing the third wave of research. The review identified 32 records that posed 117 unique criticisms and critiques of various areas of the discipline. These could be grouped into 21 categories through conventional content analysis, culminating in six overarching themes or 'broad criticisms/critiques'. The findings suggested that positive psychology (a) lacked proper theorizing and conceptual thinking, (b) was problematic as far as measurement and methodologies were concerned, (c) was seen as a pseudoscience that lacked evidence and had poor replication, (d) lacked novelty and self-isolated itself from mainstream psychology, (e) was a decontextualized neo-liberalist ideology that caused harm, and (f) was a capitalistic venture. We briefly reflect on the findings and highlight the opportunities these criticisms and critiques present.
Envisioning the future of positive psychology (PP) requires looking at its past. To that end, I first review prior critiques of PP to underscore that certain early problems have persisted over time. I then selectively examine recent research to illustrate progress in certain areas as well as draw attention to recurrent problems. Key among them is promulgation of poorly constructed measures of well-being and reliance on homogeneous, privileged research samples. Another concern is the commercialization of PP, which points to the need for greater oversight and quality control in profit-seeking endeavors. Looking ahead, I advocate for future science tied to contemporary challenges, particularly ever-widening inequality and the pandemic. These constitute intersecting catastrophes that need scientific attention. Such problems bring into focus “neglected negatives” that may be fueling current difficulties, including greed, indifference, and stupidity. Anger, which defies easy characterization as positive or negative, also warrants greater scientific study. Going forward I advocate for greater study of domains that likely nurture good lives and just societies – namely, participation in the arts and encounters with nature, both currently under study. Overall, my entreaty to PP is to reckon with persistent problems from its past, while striving toward a future that is societally relevant and virtuous.
Since 2000, research within positive psychology has exploded, as reflected in dozens of meta-analyses of different interventions and targeted processes, including strength spotting, positive affect, meaning in life, mindfulness, gratitude, hope, and passion. Frequently, researchers treat positive psychology processes of change as distinct from each other and unrelated to processes in clinical psychology. This paper presents a comprehensive framework for positive psychology processes that crosses theoretical orientation, links coherently to clinical psychology and its more dominantly “negative” processes, and supports practitioners in their efforts to personalize positive psychological interventions. We argue that a multi-dimensional and multi-level extended evolutionary approach can organize effective processes of change in psychosocial interventions, by focusing interventions on context-appropriate variation, selection, and retention of processes, arranged in terms of key biopsychosocial dimensions across psychological, biophysiological, and sociocultural levels of analysis. We review widely studied positive psychology constructs and programs and show how this evolutionary approach can readily accommodate them and provide a common language and framework for improving human and community flourishing. We conclude that Interventions should start with the person, not the protocol.
The past 150 years have seen remarkable advances in the study of wellbeing. To appreciate the value and significance of these developments, this paper offers a historical perspective on their dynamics, arguing that we have seen four great waves of wellbeing scholarship in the modern West. I begin by exploring the wave metaphor itself, and then propose that these waves have been unfurling in a Western cultural ‘ocean.’ As such, I then explore key historical currents that have shaped this ocean, including Greek philosophy, Christianity, the Renaissance, and the Enlightenment. From there, the narrative considers the emergence of the first wave (psychiatry and psychotherapy), second wave (humanistic psychology), and third wave (positive psychology). The paper concludes by suggesting we are seeing an emerging fourth wave of ‘global wellbeing scholarship,’ in which these Western waters are beginning to intermingle with other regional oceans (which have likewise progressed through their own developmental currents and waves), creating a more globally inclusive picture of wellbeing.
Several reviews of attribution theory have been published to integrate the existing knowledge of the field. However, given the breadth and volume of scientific research in this area, prior reviews tend to limit their scope to certain time periods or domains, and thus, provide only a partial picture. To complement prior reviews, the current review used document cocitation analysis (DCA), a bibliometric approach, to provide a more holistic view of attribution research. DCA involves examining the frequency with which 2 documents are jointly cited to reveal a map of the intellectual structure of a given field. Four clusters emerged from the cocitation analysis, each representing a separate theme. The first cluster of documents contained seminal works by founding theorists such as Heider, Kelley, as well as Jones and Davis, addressing how people answer “why” questions. The second cluster was centered on Weiner’s contributions to the theory, such as a classification system for causes. The third cluster demonstrated the value of attribution theory in explaining and predicting workplace outcomes. The fourth cluster revealed how attribution theory can be used to predict social behavior in a variety of situations. This review provides a visualization and insight into the underlying knowledge base of attribution theory.
Most assessments of well-being have relied on retrospective accounts, measured by global evaluative well-being scales. Following the recent debates focused on the assessment of hedonic and eudaimonic well-being based on the elements of the PERMA theory, the current study aimed to shed further light onto the measurement of PERMA elements in daily life and their temporal dynamics. Through an Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA) design (N=160), we examined the dynamics of change (e.g., baselines and intra-individual variability) in the PERMA elements using the mPERMA measure, which is an EMA-adapted version of the PERMA Profiler. Findings revealed that momentary experiences of well-being, quantified via PERMA elements, map onto their corresponding hedonic or eudaimonic well-being components, and its dynamical features provide novel insights into predicting global well-being. This work offers avenues for future research to assess well-being in real-time and real-world contexts in ecologically valid ways, while eliminating recall bias.
Cultural conformity in psychological constructs has been shown to play a critical role in people’s health and well-being. The more people’s individual beliefs about a construct aligns with the cultural norms, their cultural identity is more cultivated, leading to higher levels of well-being. Considering feeling loved in everyday contexts as a social construct that people indicate shared beliefs and cultural consensus for, in the current study, we explored congruency in cultural beliefs on love and its association with well-being in the United States. 495 participants in the United States evaluated everyday life scenarios in terms of whether they elicit loving feelings or not. We examined the correspondence between people’s beliefs about what makes themselves (i.e., self) feel loved compared to what they think makes others feel loved and the cultural consensus on indicators of love. We then explored how individual differences in these correspondence measures are associated with people’s well-being. We reported evidence for the lack as well as for the existence of these associations using Bayes Factors in the Bayesian statistical framework. Results indicated that both self-other and self-consensus agreements are meaningfully associated with individuals’ well-being. Furthermore, when examining disagreements in self vs. other ratings of love, we found that one type of disagreement (believing other people feel loved in scenarios that I don’t), is associated with lower levels of well-being. This meaningful relationship to well-being was not visible in the case where a person would report feeling loved in a scenario while believing that others would not. Implications for well-being interventions are further discussed.
Positive organizational psychology (POP) is a research area that focuses on the positive aspects of optimal functioning at work. Although consolidated and with a large volume of publications, no bibliometric analysis has been performed that allows knowing its high-level structure, developments, and distribution of knowledge since its origins. The objective is to analyze the 7181 articles published in POP on the Web of Science Core Collection (WoSCC). A retrospective bibliometric analysis and science mapping were performed. The title, authors, institutions, countries, scientific categories, journals, keywords, year, and citations were extracted from WoSCC. Impact factor, quartile, and country were collected from Journal Citation Reports (JCR) 2019. Authors were classified according to the proposal of Crane, and Bradford’s law was calculated. The results show that it is an area with more than 100 years of experience, divided into three stages of different productivity and visibility, highlighting a decrease in its visibility in recent years. With a multidisciplinary and international interest, psychology and business and economics stand out, especially in countries such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Netherlands. Four popular study topics emerged: well-being at work, positive leadership, work engagement, and psychological capital.
Neural dynamics in response to affective stimuli are linked to momentary emotional experiences. The amygdala, in particular, is involved in subjective emotional experience and assigning value to neutral stimuli. Because amygdala activity persistence following aversive events varies across individuals, some may evaluate subsequent neutral stimuli more negatively than others. This may lead to more frequent and long-lasting momentary emotional experiences, which may also be linked to selfevaluative measures of psychological well-being (PWB). Despite extant links between daily affect and PWB, few studies have directly explored the links between amygdala persistence, daily affective experience, and PWB. To that end, we examined data from 52 human adults (67% female) in the Midlife in the United States study who completed measures of PWB, daily affect, and functional MRI (fMRI). During fMRI, participants viewed affective images followed by a neutral facial expression, permitting quantification of individual differences in the similarity of amygdala representations of affective stimuli and neutral facial expressions that follow. Using representational similarity analysis, neural persistence following aversive stimuli was operationalized as similarity between the amygdala activation patterns while encoding negative images and the neutral facial expressions shown afterward. Individuals demonstrating less persistent activation patterns in the left amygdala to aversive stimuli reported more positive and less negative affect in daily life. Further, daily positive affect served as an indirect link between left amygdala persistence and PWB. These results clarify important connections between individual differences in brain function, daily experiences of affect, and well-being.
The development of academic fields is often described through the metaphor of ‘waves.’ Following the instantiation of positive psychology (the first wave), scholarship emerged looking critically at the notions of positive and negative, becoming known as its second wave. More recently, we discern an equally significant shift, namely scholarship that in various ways goes beyond the individual and embraces greater complexity. This includes going beyond the individual person as the primary focus of enquiry to look more deeply at the groups and systems in which people are embedded. It also involves becoming more interdisciplinary and multicultural, and embracing a wider range of methodologies. We submit that these interrelated ripples constitute a form of epistemological ‘broadening’ that merit the label of an incoming ‘third wave.’ This paper identifies the key dynamics of this wave, allowing appreciation not only of the field’s leading edge, but also its developmental potential into the future.
The transitional years of early adulthood, with key tasks of identity and intimacy development, engender both opportunities and risks for well-being. We propose that the conceptualization and measurement of early adults’ well-being can be improved through (a) an integration of ideas from developmental and psychological science on well-being, (b) the use of short, daily momentary assessments of well-being, and (c) a developmentally-informed examination of the structure of well-being within (and not just across) time. We developed a daily assessment of well-being based on the PERMA model (Seligman, 2011 Seligman, M. E. P. (2011). Flourish. Simon & Schuster. [Google Scholar]) and used network analysis to gain understanding from this data. Using Ecological Momentary Assessments, we assessed the five PERMA elements in college students’ daily life and their network properties. Consistent with the PERMA model, network analysis showed items clustered around theorized elements and formed a unitary network of well-being. Consistent with developmental theory, we found that having positive relationships and positive emotion were most central to early adults’ daily well-being.
This article reviews the causal implications of latent variable and psychometric network models for the validation of personality trait questionnaires. These models imply different data generating mechanisms that have important consequences for the validity and validation of questionnaires. From this review, we formalize a framework for assessing the evidence for the validity of questionnaires from the psychometric network perspective. We focus specifically on the structural phase of validation where items are assessed for redundancy, dimensionality, and internal structure. In this discussion, we underline the importance of identifying unique personality components (i.e., an item or set of items that share a unique common cause) and representing the breadth of each trait's domain in personality networks. After, we argue that psychometric network models have measures that are statistically equivalent to factor models, but suggest that their substantive interpretations differ. Finally, we provide a novel measure of structural consistency, which provides complementary information to internal consistency measures. We close with future directions for how external validation can be executed using psychometric network models.
The science of wellbeing has come a long way from the early days of measuring wellbeing via a nation’s GDP, and wellbeing measures and concepts continue to proliferate to capture its various elements. Yet, much of this activity has reflected concepts from Western cultures, despite the emphasis placed on wellbeing in all corners of the globe. To meet the challenges and opportunities arising from cross-disciplinary research worldwide, the Well-Being for Planet Earth Foundation and the Gallup World Poll have joined forces to add more culturallyrelevant constructs and questions to existing Gallup modules. In this white paper, we review the discussion from the international well-being summit in Kyoto, Japan (August 2019), where nine such additions were proposed and highlight why a more global view of wellbeing is needed. Overall, the new items reflect a richer view of wellbeing than life satisfaction alone and include hedonic and eudaimonic facets of wellbeing, social wellbeing, the role of culture, community, nature, and governance. These additions allow for the measurement of a broader conceptualization of wellbeing, more refined and nuanced cross-cultural comparisons, and facilitate a better examination of the causes of variation in global wellbeing. The new Gallup World Poll additions will be trialled in 2020, with additional inclusions from this summit to be made in 2021.
The development of leaders and leadership is a formative research area and a considerable industry in practice. Existing reviews are often restricted in scope or by subjective inclusion of topics or documents which limits integrative implications for the leader/ship development (LD) field. We address theoretical and methodological limitations by mapping the LD field with a comprehensive, objective, and integrative review. To do so we employed three bibliometric approaches, historiography, document co-citation, bibliographic coupling, and included 2,390 primary and 78,178 secondary documents. We show patterns in the evolution of the LD field, followed by four central observations about the current state and trends in LD. To shift the science and practice of LD we develop tangible suggestions for future research within the three research directions: (1) Pursuing research within the current framing of LD, (2) Striving for frame-breaking LD research, and (3) How We Can Get There – Transforming LD Research.
The positive manifold—the finding that cognitive ability measures demonstrate positive correlations with one another—has led to models of intelligence that include a general cognitive ability or general intelligence (g). This view has been reinforced using factor analysis and reflective, higher-order latent variable models. However, a new theory of intelligence, Process Overlap Theory (POT), posits that g is not a psychological attribute but an index of cognitive abilities that results from an interconnected network of cognitive processes. These competing theories of intelligence are compared using two different statistical modeling techniques: (a) latent variable modeling and (b) psychometric network analysis. Network models display partial correlations between pairs of observed variables that demonstrate direct relationships among observations. Secondary data analysis was conducted using the Hungarian Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale Fourth Edition (H-WAIS-IV). The underlying structure of the H-WAIS-IV was first assessed using confirmatory factor analysis assuming a reflective, higher-order model and then reanalyzed using psychometric network analysis. The compatibility (or lack thereof) of these theoretical accounts of intelligence with the data are discussed.
Despite the rapid growth and uptake of the positive psychological perspective by researchers and general audiences, hype regarding the field’s potential can lead to exaggerated claims, over-inflated expectations, disillusionment, dismissal, and unintentional harms. To help mature the field, we propose Systems Informed Positive Psychology (SIPP), which explicitly incorporates principles and concepts from the systems sciences into positive psychology theory, methodologies, practices, and discourse to optimize human social systems and the individuals within them. We describe historical underpinnings of SIPP, outline the SIPP perspective, clarify epistemological, political, and ethical assumptions, and highlight implications for research and practice. We suggest that SIPP can generate possibilities for creating sustainable unimagined futures.
The aim of the present study was to create the Greek version of the PERMA Profiler questionnaire, which measures the five pillars of wellbeing: positive emotions, engagement, positive relationships, meaning in life, and accomplishment based on Seligman’s (2011) theory, and to examine its factor structure, measurement invariance, reliability, and convergent and discriminant validity using data from a lifespan sample of 2539 participants. We have tested two models of wellbeing through confirmatory factor analysis, but the first-order five-factor structure of the wellbeing was finally supported. The results also demonstrated acceptable internal consistency and test-retest reliability for the overall wellbeing items and for almost all wellbeing components. The Greek version of PERMA Profiler demonstrated good convergent validity with several wellbeing indices and discriminant validity with psychological symptoms and experiencing of negative emotions. Limitations, recommendations for future studies and the significance of using a multidimensional measure of wellbeing are discussed.
Recent research in the educational context has focused not only on academic achievement but also on subjective well-being (SWB) as both play a major role in students’ lives. Whereas the determinants of academic achievement have been extensively investigated, little research has been conducted on school-related determinants of SWB in comparison with other students’ characteristics. In the present cross-sectional study, we set out to investigate whether perceived school climate predicts school grades and SWB above and beyond other variables that are important for SWB and academic achievement. A sample of 767 8th and 9th grade students (n = 361 female adolescents; age: M = 14.07 years, SD = 0.92) completed measures of SWB, perceived school climate, test anxiety, self-efficacy, and interest. Grade point average (GPA) indicated students’ academic achievement. Data were analyzed with latent structural equation models in which GPA and SWB were regressed on the school climate variables and students’ characteristics. Results indicated that a positive school climate as well as self-efficacy and the worry component of test anxiety predicted SWB and/or GPA after all other variables were controlled for. Directions for future research and the importance of school climate variables on adolescents’ SWB and academic achievement are discussed.
Extrapolating from B. L. Fredrickson's (1998, 2001) broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions, the authors hypothesized that positive emotions are active ingredients within trait resilience. U.S. college students (18 men and 28 women) were tested in early 2001 and again in the weeks following the September 11th terrorist attacks. Mediational analyses showed that positive emotions experienced in the wake of the attacks - gratitude, interest, love, and so forth - fully accounted for the relations between (a) precrisis resilience and later development of depressive symptoms and (b) precrisis resilience and postcrisis growth in psychological resources. Findings suggest that positive emotions in the aftermath of crises buffer resilient people against depression and fuel thriving, consistent with the broaden-and-build theory. Discussion touches on implications for coping.
Morality is commonly held up as the pinnacle of goodness but can also be a source of significant problems, interfering with societal functioning and progress. We review the literature regarding how morality diverges from nonmoral attitudes, biases our cognitive processing, and the ways in which it can lead to negative interpersonal and intergroup consequences. To illustrate the negative implications of morality, we detail two specific examples of how moral convictions impair societal progress: the rejection of science and technology, and political polarization in the United States. Specifically, we discuss how moral convictions can cause individuals to challenge scientific facts (e.g., evolution), oppose technologies that can improve health and well-being (e.g., vaccinations and GMO foods), and fuel political polarization and segregation. We conclude this review by suggesting strategies for policy makers and individuals to help overcome the problems morality can cause.
We review evidence on whether subjective well-being (SWB) can influence health, why it might do so, and what we know about the conditions where this is more or less likely to occur. This review also explores how various methodological approaches inform the study of the connections between subjective well-being and health and longevity outcomes. Our review of this growing literature indicates areas where data are substantial and where much more research is needed. We conclude that SWB can sometimes influence health, and review a number of reasons why it does so. A key open question is when it does and does not do so—in terms of populations likely to be affected, types of SWB that are most influential (including which might be harmful), and types of health and illnesses that are most likely to be affected. We also describe additional types of research that are now much needed in this burgeoning area of interest, for example, cross-cultural studies, animal research, and experimental interventions designed to raise long-term SWB and assess the effects on physical health. This research area is characterised both by potentially extremely important findings, and also by pivotal research issues and questions.
The self-determination theory emphasizes the importance of satisfaction with autonomy, competence, and relatedness for a person’s psychological growth and well-being. This study examines associations between autonomy, competence, and relatedness with quality of life in homeless young adults; and whether possible associations are mediated by psychological distress and perceived social support. By means of face-to-face interviews, 255 homeless young adults who receive care from 10 Dutch shelter facilities for homeless young adults have been interviewed (M age = 20, 77% male, 51% Dutch Nationality) shortly after entering the facility. Autonomy, competence, and relatedness are all associated with quality of life, with competence as the highest correlate. Psychological distress mediates both competence and autonomy, and social support mediates competence as well as relatedness. These findings emphasize the importance of intervention programs for homeless young adults, focusing on the enhancement of self-determination, especially competence, to improve their quality of life.
Debates about posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) often turn on whether it is a timeless, cross-culturally valid natural phenomenon or a socially constructed idiom of distress. Most clinicians seem to favor the first view, differing only in whether they conceptualize PTSD as a discrete category or the upper end of a dimension of stress responsiveness. Yet both categorical and dimensional construals presuppose that PTSD symptoms are fallible indicators reflective of an underlying, latent variable. This presupposition has governed psychopathology research for decades, but it rests on problematic psychometric premises. In this article, we review an alternative, network perspective for conceptualizing mental disorders as causal systems of interacting symptoms, and we illustrate this perspective via analyses of PTSD symptoms reported by survivors of the Wenchuan earthquake in China. Finally, we foreshadow emerging computational methods that may disclose the causal structure of mental disorders.
The scientific study of well-being has been strongly influenced by ideas from a number of related fields, including different areas of psychology. Two major philosophical traditions—hedonia and eudaimonia—underscore much of our current understanding of well-being, and are reflected across early and contemporary psychological theories of well-being. These traditions help delineate the various conceptualizations of well-being and its components; moreover, these traditions influence which research questions are asked, and where and how answers are sought. This has resulted in a plethora of categories and terms referring to similar, yet distinct, concepts such as: well-being, happiness, optimal or positive experiences, life satisfaction, and flourishing. Given the difficulties of distinguishing these concepts, this paper aims to provide clarity by delineating the major orientations in positive psychology. We provide a “road-map” to theories and models of well-being found within positive psychology, thereby providing a starting a point from which an integrative framework of theories and models of well-being can be developed. To that end, also included in this review is a selection of well-being models that lie beyond the traditional frameworks. We conclude with a consideration of several criticisms that have been directed at positive psychology, and provide recommendations for future directions.
Families play an important role in supporting individuals with autism spectrum disorder across the lifespan. Indicators of family wellbeing can help to establish benchmarks for service provision and evaluation; however, a critical first step is a clear understanding of the construct in question. The purpose of the current scoping review was to (a) summarize current conceptualizations and measurements of family wellbeing, (b) synthesize key findings, and (c) highlight gaps and limitations in the extant literature. A final review of 86 articles highlighted the difficulty of synthesizing findings of family wellbeing in the autism spectrum disorder literature due to varied measurement techniques and the limited use of a common theoretical direction. Considerations for future research are presented with an eye toward policy relevance.
One of the most recent influential constructs based on positive psychology is PERMA, a framework that articulates five major building blocks that contribute to well-being: positive emotions, engagement, relationships, meaning, and accomplishment. In 2020, 4 additional building blocks were added – physical health, mindset, environment, and economic security – expanding the framework into PERMA+4 to describe 9 building blocks that contribute to well-being and positive functioning. The purpose of this systematic review is to determine if the empirical evidence supports the assertion that PERMA and PERMA+4 are strongly associated and predictive of well-being and positive functioning. While strong associations were found in this review, most of the published empirical research on PERMA was found to be correlational, cross-sectional, and based on a variety of self-report surveys. Implications and recommendations for future research using rigorous experimental designs as well as opportunities for improving the measurements of PERMA and PERMA+4 are discussed.
The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted emerging adult first-year college students’ daily lives and well-being. Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) recognizes that effective and adaptive emotion regulation skills can be important for this vulnerable population’s well-being, who are going through a transitioning phase of development in challenging times. An ecological momentary assessment study collected 1,796 data points from 76 first-year college students' daily usage of emotion regulation skills and momentary experiences of well-being (PERMA; Positive emotions, Engagement, Relationship, Meaning, Accomplishment) during COVID-19 in Spring 2020. Participants were 18 to 20 years of age, 71% female, 24% male, 4% non-binary, 1% preferred not to answer, 46% White, 36% Asian or Pacific Islander, 14% Hispanic or Latinx, 13% Black or African American, 13% mixed race, 1% Native American or Eskimo Aleut, and 4% did not specify their race/ethnicity. Results from multilevel models on intensive longitudinal data revealed that specific emotion regulation skills (accumulating positives, building mastery, coping ahead) consistently predict mPERMA even when controlling for dispositional well-being. Moreover, on days of sufficient sleep hours reported, students reported higher well-being levels; on days with more interaction with other people, students were more likely to engage in emotion regulation skill behaviors; and on weekends, students were less likely to engage in emotion regulation behaviors (but not avoid substances like alcohol). Findings add to the literature on momentary well-being and emotion regulation for the population of early adult first-year college students and the COVID-19 context.
This article represents the first document co-citation on the purpose construct. Document co-citation is a bibliometric methodology that provides a clear, systematic structure for examining the intellectual foundations of a field or construct. Our analysis yielded several novel insights, including a few potentially troubling ones. For instance, it revealed that the origins of purpose, a construct that has deep roots in philosophy and significant implications for a variety of fields, derived almost exclusively from the study of psychology. Foundational work was primarily conducted by scholars in North America, and early conceptualizations of purpose were inconsistent. Originating documents often used the term interchangeably with meaning. These practices, which have persisted at least to some degree, are likely to yield inconsistent and unreliable conclusions. Implications of our findings as well as cautions and directions for future research are addressed.
In intensive longitudinal designs individuals are measured with high frequency over time. Sometimes there are multiple bursts of measurement, yielding multi-phase longitudinal data, which allow for evaluation of behavioral change at multiple timescales. From a systems theory perspective, a process that exhibits change occurring simultaneously at multiple time scales is non-stationary. Although recent methodological developments, such as dynamic systems models with time-varying parameters, have the capacity of handling non-stationarity, a more comprehensive framework may be needed for better analyzing multi-subject and multi-phase (interrupted) time series data. In this study, we propose a Bayesian growth of hierarchical autoregression (GoHiAR) model, which combines autoregressive (AR) and growth curve models (GCM) to simultaneously evaluate developmental changes in multifaceted dynamic characteristics (e.g., baseline, variability, and regulation) of psychological processes as well as individual differences in these changes. We applied the proposed model to an ecological momentary assessment (EMA) study that had an mHealth intervention phase to investigate changes of dynamic characteristics of psychological well-being process, specifically in meaning of life. Findings suggested that participants generally experienced decreased fluctuation and increased regulation of meaning of life over the course of the intervention, but the mHealth intervention did not result in credible added benefit.
Despite the growing deployment of network representation throughout psychological sciences, the question of whether and how networks can systematically describe the effects of psychological interventions remains elusive. Towards this end, we capitalize on recent breakthrough in network control theory, the engineering study of networked interventions, to investigate a representative psychological attitude modification experiment. This study examined 30 healthy participants who answered 11 questions about their attitude toward eating meat. They then received 11 arguments to challenge their attitude on the questions, after which they were asked again the same set of questions. Using this data, we constructed networks that quantify the connections between the responses and tested: 1) if the observed psychological effect, in terms of sensitivity and specificity, relates to the regional network topology as described by control theory, 2) if the size of change in responses relates to whole-network topology that quantifies the “ease” of change as described by control theory, and 3) if responses after intervention could be predicted based on formal results from control theory. We found that 1) the interventions that had higher regional topological relevance (the so-called controllability scores) had stronger effect (r > 0.5), the intervention sensitivities were systematically lower for the interventions that were “easier to control” (r = -0.49), and that the model offered substantial prediction accuracy (r = 0.36). Finally, we compared results based on subjective as well as data-driven models and found that, across all tests, the results from the data-driven approach explained a larger size of effect. Taken together, our results suggest that psychological interventions can be studied using network control theory and that data-driven models provide a reliable medium.
For half a century, the dominant paradigm in psychotherapy research has been to develop syndrome-specific treatment protocols for hypothesized but unproved latent disease entities, as defined by psychiatric nosological systems. While this approach provided a common language for mental health problems, it failed to achieve its ultimate goal of conceptual and treatment utility. Process-based therapy (PBT) offers an alternative approach to understanding and treating psychological problems, and promoting human prosperity. PBT targets empirically established biopsychosocial processes of change that researchers have shown are functionally important to long terms goals and outcomes. By building on concepts of known clinical utility, and organizing them into coherent theoretical models, an idiographic, functional-analytic approach to diagnosis is within our grasp. We argue that a multi-dimensional, multi-level extended evolutionary meta-model (EEMM) provides consilience and a common language for process-based diagnosis. The EEMM applies the evolutionary concepts of context-appropriate variation, selection, and retention to key biopsychosocial dimensions and levels related to human suffering, problems, and positive functioning. The EEMM is a meta-model of diagnostic and intervention approaches that can accommodate any set of evidence-based change processes, regardless of the specific therapy orientation. In a preliminary way, it offers an idiographic, functional analytic, and clinically useful alternative to contemporary psychiatric nosological systems.
The objective of the present study is twofold: (1) to show the aims and means of quantitative interpretation of bibliographic features in bibliometrics and their re-interpretation in research policy, and (2) to summarise the state-of-art in self-citation research. The authors describe three approaches to the role of author self-citations and possible conflicts arising from the different perspectives.L’objectif de cette étude est de caractériser les effets de quantification comme appliqués dans la bibliométrie et leur interprétation en politique de recherche. Nous présentons un sommaire de la recherche en ce qui concerne le phénomène des auto-citations et nous décrivons trois possibilités d’expliquer les auto-citations aussi bien que les conflits qui résultent de ces points de vues.
The effect of a grateful outlook on psychological and physical well-being was examined. In Studies 1 and 2, participants were randomly assigned to 1 of 3 experimental conditions (hassles, gratitude listing, and either neutral life events or social comparison); they then kept weekly (Study 1) or daily (Study 2) records of their moods, coping behaviors, health behaviors, physical symptoms, and overall life appraisals. In a 3rd study, persons with neuromuscular disease were randomly assigned to either the gratitude condition or to a control condition. The gratitude-outlook groups exhibited heightened well-being across several, though not all, of the outcome measures across the 3 studies, relative to the comparison groups. The effect on positive affect appeared to be the most robust finding. Results suggest that a conscious focus on blessings may have emotional and interpersonal benefits.
Clinical science seems to have reached a tipping point. It appears that a new paradigm is beginning to emerge that is questioning the validity and utility of the medical illness model, which assumes that latent disease entities are targeted with specific therapy protocols. A new generation of evidence-based care has begun to move toward process-based therapies to target core mediators and moderators based on testable theories. This could represent a paradigm shift in clinical science with far-reaching implications. Clinical science might see a decline of named therapies defined by set technologies, a decline of broad schools, a rise of testable models, a rise of mediation and moderation studies, the emergence of new forms of diagnosis based on functional analysis, a move from nomothetic to idiographic approaches, and a move toward processes that specify modifiable elements. These changes could integrate or bridge different treatment orientations, settings, and even cultures.
Seligman (2011) hypothesized that PERMA (Positive Emotion, Engagement, Relationships, Meaning, and Accomplishment) are the elements of well-being. Goodman, Disabato, Kashdan & Kaufmann (2017) reported strong evidence that subjective well-being is the final common path of such elements and their data are entirely consistent with Seligman’s hypothesis. They argued, incorrectly however, that he suggested that PERMA constituted a different kind of well-being rather than just its building blocks. The complicated issue, one that transcends psychometrics, of how to decide on elements of well-being is discussed.
The empirical science of subjective well-being, popularly referred to as happiness or satisfaction, has grown enormously in the past decade. In this Review, we selectively highlight and summarize key researched areas that continue to develop. We describe the validity of measures and their potential biases, as well as the scientific methods used in this field. We describe some of the predictors of subjective well-being such as temperament, income and supportive social relationships. Higher subjective well-being has been associated with good health and longevity, better social relationships, work performance and creativity. At the community and societal levels, cultures differ not only in their levels of well-being but also to some extent in the types of subjective well-being they most value. Furthermore, there are both universal and unique predictors of subjective well-being in various societies. National accounts of subjective well-being to help inform policy decisions at the community and societal levels are now being considered and adopted. Finally we discuss the unknowns in the science and needed future research.
We compared Seligman’s PERMA model of well-being with Diener’s model of subjective well-being (SWB) to determine if the newer PERMA captured a type of well-being unique from the older SWB. Participants were 517 adults who completed self-report measures of SWB, PERMA, and VIA character strengths. Results from four analytic techniques suggest the factor underlying PERMA is capturing the same type of well-being as SWB. Confirmatory factor analysis yielded a latent correlation of r = 0.98 between SWB and PERMA. Exploratory structural equation modeling found two highly related factors (r = 0.85) that did not map onto PERMA and SWB. SWB and PERMA factors showed similar relationships with 24 character strengths (average correlation difference = 0.02). Latent profile analyses yielded subgroups of people who merely scored high, low, or mid-range on well-being indicators. Our findings suggest that while lower-order indicators SWB and PERMA have unique features, they converge onto a single well-being factor.
Objectives: Sports coaching can be an inherently stressful occupation because coaches must fulfill multiple roles and cope with various expectations. Further, stress and well-being have implications for coach performance. The objective of this study was, therefore, to conduct a systematic review of literature on stressors, coping, and well-being among sports coaches.
Design: A systematic review using PRIMSA guidelines.
Method: Thorough and systematic literature searches of PsycINFO, SPORTDiscus, and Web of Science were conducted. To be eligible for inclusion, papers had to be published in the English language between January 1994 and March 2016 and as full papers in peer-reviewed journals.
Results: The final sample consisted of 38 studies that were conducted with 4,188 sports coaches. This sample consisted of 19 qualitative, 17 quantitative, and two mixed methods studies. The findings demonstrate that coaches experience a variety of stressors relating to their performance and that of the athletes they work with in addition to organizational, contextual, interpersonal, and intrapersonal stressors. The findings also highlight that coaches use a variety of coping strategies (e.g., problem solving, social support, escaping the stressful environment) to reduce the negative outcomes of stress. Five studies that were included in this review focused on coaches’ well-being and found that basic psychological needs satisfaction, lack of basic psychological needs thwarting, and self-determined motivation are needed for coaches to be psychologically well.
Conclusion: Future research should address gaps in extant literature by using longitudinal study designs to explore coaches’ appraisals of stressors, coping effectiveness, social support, and well-being among the unique sports coaching population.
Keywords: cognitive-affective, cognitive-motivational-relational, high performance, transactional
In the book Flourish (2011), Seligman defined wellbeing in terms of five pillars: Positive emotion, Engagement, Relationships, Meaning, and Accomplishment, or PERMA. We developed the PERMA-Profiler as a brief measure of PERMA. We first compiled hundreds of theoretically relevant items. Three studies ( N = 7,188) reduced, tested, and refined items, resulting in a final set of 15 questions (three items per PERMA domain). Eight additional filler items were added, which assess overall wellbeing, negative emotion, loneliness, and physical health, resulting in a final 23-item measure. A series of eight additional studies ( N = 31,966) were conducted to test the psychometrics of the measure. The PERMA-Profiler demonstrates acceptable model fit, internal and cross-time consistency, and evidence for content, convergent, and divergent validity. Scores are reported visually as a profile across domains, reflecting the multidimensional nature of flourishing. The PERMA-Profiler adds to the toolbox of wellbeing measures, allowing individuals to monitor their wellbeing across multiple psychosocial domains.
Contemporary classification systems for mental disorders assume that abnormal behaviors are expressions of latent disease entities. An alternative to the latent disease model is the complex network approach. Instead of assuming that symptoms arise from an underlying disease entity, the complex network approach holds that disorders exist as systems of interrelated elements of a network. This approach also provides a framework for the understanding of therapeutic change. Depending on the structure of the network, change can occur abruptly once the network reaches a critical threshold (the tipping point). Homogeneous and highly connected networks often recover more slowly from local perturbations when the network approaches the tipping point, potentially making it possible to predict treatment change, relapse, and recovery. In this article, we discuss the complex network approach as an alternative to the latent disease model and its implications for classification, therapy, relapse, and recovery.
The traditional view of translating research to policy is reframed as a complex multidirectional interaction based on international case studies presented at the 2015 Active Living Research conference. The United Kingdom developed a process for reviewing and synthesizing evidence to inform policy, but policy makers were often ahead of the guidance. In Australia, translation of research to policy has been facilitated by brokering the relationship between researchers and policy makers. The best example of dissemination of the evidence for physical activity promotion into a national program comes from
This chapter reviews the literature on culture and well-being focusing on the following three topics: (a) historical and cultural variations in concepts of well-being, (b) measurement and methodological issues, and (c) cultural differences in mean levels, correlates, and consequences of well-being. The three main theses of this chapter are (a) there are diverse lay concepts of happiness and well-being across times and cultures, ranging from "fortune and good luck" to "the satisfaction of one's desires" to "pleasure and enjoyment," (b) therefore, well-being should be assessed using diverse measures that tap into these different concepts of well-being, and (c) national differences in mean levels, correlates, and consequences of well-being should be interpreted with the diversity of lay concepts of and beliefs about happiness and the limitations of different measures (e.g., global vs. online reports of well-being) in mind.
Counseling psychologists are in a prime position to claim preeminence in the field of applied positive psychology. A number of misunderstandings or misconceptions of positive psychology seem to interfere, however, with the focus (or lack thereof) that has been placed upon training counseling psychologists to utilize and contribute to positive psychological scholarship and applications. In this article, the most commonly reported misconceptions are addressed, and foundational information regarding positive psychological constructs, theories, and processes most relevant to the applied work of counseling psychologists is reviewed. Counseling psychologists are encouraged to claim positive psychology as the logical extension of our humanistic roots and to consider how to both utilize and contribute to the growing body of positive psychological scholarship.