What is positive psychology?

If psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior, positive psychology is the branch of psychology that studies how individuals and communities thrive.

The founder of positive psychology, Martin Seligman, viewed modern western psychology to be hyper focused on mental illness, which he coined, the “age of melancholy.” If you asked him what the purpose of his field is, he would say, “to steer psychology away from the darkness and toward light.” (Gibbon, 2020).

Positive psychology emphasizes the value in studying human strengths and how to maximize well-being and happiness. The field extends psychology beyond a branch of medicine concerned with illness or health, but with work, education, insight, love, growth, and play (Gibbon, 2020). In many ways, the “goal” of positive psychology is to give people the tools to thrive as individuals and as part of a community.

How can positive psychology concepts be utilized as an intervention within schools?

Children and adolescents spend the majority of their time in schools. It follows that schools play a major role in their development. Beyond markers of mental illness, school environments can either promote or inhibit a student’s relationships, cognitive development, social skills, academic attainment, emotional, and behavioral control.

Platt and colleagues (2020) created and implemented a positive psychology intervention (PPI) in secondary schools across the Northwest of England to study whether they could improve student well-being.

These interventions were 6 weekly 1-hour sessions, taking place in 14 schools during normal school hours and delivered by undergraduates and Master of Science psychology students.

Each student received a workbook in which they could record all of the work they did in sessions and at home, as well as any thoughts and feelings they had about the experience. The six sessions instructed students on different methods for improving their well-being. The first session introduced the students to positive psychology. Session two gave the students an opportunity to answer the question, “What makes me happy?” Session three focused on the power of hope, while session four focused on growth mindset and gratitude. Session five focused on mindfulness and the final session provided an overview of the topics covered with advice for building on these concepts for the future. As the sessions continued, the intervention leaders incorporated activities such as performing random acts of kindness, mindfulness exercises, and gratitude letter-writing.

To measure the extent to which well-being improved among the students, they used three outcome measures, outlined in Table 1, which students filled out before session one and after session six.

Note. Adapted from ” The Hummingbird Project: A Positive Psychology Intervention for Secondary School Students ” by I. A. Platt, C. Kannangara, M. Tytherleigh, and J. Carson. 2020, Frontiers in Psychology,11. Copyright 2020 by Platt, Kannangara, Tytherleigh and Carson.

As illustrated by Table 2, a paired sample t-test was performed using the questionnaire responses to compare the average pre-test and post-test scores on the well-being, academic resilience, and hope measures. Table 2 shows that across all three measures, the average child in this sample saw a significant improvement in their scores, compared to a child who did not participate in the project.

Note. Adapted from ” The Hummingbird Project: A Positive Psychology Intervention for Secondary School Students ” by I. A. Platt, C. Kannangara, M. Tytherleigh, and J. Carson. 2020, Frontiers in Psychology,11. Copyright 2020 by Platt, Kannangara, Tytherleigh and Carson.

Table 3 depicts the results of the one-way multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) used to examine if student-selection type affected the impact of the PPI on outcome measures.

Note. Adapted from ” The Hummingbird Project: A Positive Psychology Intervention for Secondary School Students ” by I. A. Platt, C. Kannangara, M. Tytherleigh, and J. Carson. 2020, Frontiers in Psychology,11. Copyright 2020 by Platt, Kannangara, Tytherleigh and Carson.

Nearly half of the students who participated in the intervention were selected to participate by their teachers based on a perceived need for mental health intervention. These students are represented as the “selected” group. The “non-selected” group represents the students who participated in the PPI that did not have a perceived need for mental health intervention.

The results revealed that the selected students had larger increases in their scores on all measures than the students who were not selected to participate based on a perceived need for mental health intervention. The improvements in scores of the selected students were all statistically significant, while the average scores of the non-selected students showed significant improvements only in their levels of hope (CHS).

The researchers noted that the non-significant differences among the non-selected students might be the result of a ceiling effect that limits the ability of the PPI to improve the mental health of those students who are already flourishing. This explanation is plausible, given that the average pre- and post- test scores for the non-selected students were significantly higher on all measures than those in the selected group. These results suggest that the PPI could potentially be used to improve the mental health of school-aged children with existing mental health problems.

How can this PPI be adapted as an intervention within other schools?

For schools looking to maximize the impact of PPIs on student well-being, they should establish interventions embedded in the curriculum for the entire school year. Additionally, schools should provide teachers with the resources and education needed to successfully lead the PPI. An obstacle to establishing long-term PPIs in schools is that it may require changes to be made in teacher training, school leadership training, and the system-wide educational culture. The costs involved in this process could make implementation of a long-term intervention impractical for many schools.

An alternative to the long-term PPI embedded within the school curriculum is the short-term PPI that focuses on one pillar of positive psychology, such as gratitude, growth-mindset, or mindfulness. In this way, teachers would require less training and the program could be delivered at a relatively low cost. A drawback to shorter-term PPIs is that research shows mixed results of their effects on student well-being (Suldo et. al., 2014).

As shown by the Hummingbird Project, however, a six-week positive psychology intervention can still significantly improve well-being, academic resilience, and hope among secondary school students at a relatively low cost, and without a need for extensive training.
To learn more about positive psychology interventions, check out the Hummingbird Project’s website: https://www.medequip4kids.org.uk/hummingbird-project/

References

1. Gibbon, P. (2020). Martin Seligman and the rise of positive psychology. National Endowment for the Humanities. https://www.neh.gov/article/martin-seligman-and-rise-positive-psycholog
2. MedEquip4Kids. (n.d.) Hummingbird project. https://www.medequip4kids.org.uk/hummingbird-project/
3. Platt, I. A., Kannangara, C., Tytherleigh M., Carson J. (2020). The Hummingbird Project: A positive psychology intervention for secondary school students. Frontiers in Psychology, 11. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.02012
4. Roth, R. A., Suldo, S. M., and Ferron, J. M. (2017). Improving middle school students’ subjective well-being: Efficacy of a multicomponent positive psychology intervention targeting small groups of youth. Sch. Psychol. Rev. 46, 21–41. https://doi.org/10.17105/10.17105/spr46-1.21-41