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Positive Psychology and
Positive therapy
Jefferson
Thomsan began the Declaration of Independence with
the statement that human beings aren't only created equal but "endowed by
their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, [and] that among these are Life,
Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." Happiness was the word he chose,
not pursuit of power or economic gain. He didn't think that a happy human life
was a reward for obeying a Supreme Being or a set of rules laid
down in a holy book. He was a lover of the Greek classics, a believer in
progress, a deist, and a man of the Enlightenment. His faith lay
in the notion that philosophic inquiry, reason, and study of the natural world
could lead one to what Aristotle called "the good life." That was the
bedrock of Jefferson's secular faith--a view that many positive psychologists
share today.
Positive psychologists
urge people to maximize strengths rather than correct weaknesses, and to turn
their work into a moral calling. positive psychologist
also argue that having big social circles maximize life satisfaction. complex identities, according to positive psychologists say,
are a crucial ingredient in that elusive, nebulous, eternally-sought-after
state we call happiness.
The Positive Psychology movement is a sunny
place for people whose lives have been lived at least partly in shadow. And
it's impossible to fully understand it without understanding the less-than-rosy
early life of its leading popularize, Martin Seligman.
Seligman committed himself to the study of
helplessness, while making double-sure that he wasn't helpless himself. A high
achiever, he graduated from Princeton and went on to graduate studies in
psychology at the University of Pennsylvania. In 1964, when he was 21, he
watched a group of lab dogs in their electrified wire cages there, acting as
despairing as his own dad. They were slumped with their heads on their paws,
whimpering, and doing nothing to avoid the shocks being administered to them.
In a previous experiment, they'd been unable to escape being shocked. Now, even
though the experimental parameters had changed and they could leap to safety on
the other side of the cage, they didn't. They simply endured. Seligman
concluded that the dogs were no longer learning sets of discrete behaviors
through reward and punishment, as the Skinnerian behaviorism of the time
maintained they would. They'd come to an overarching conclusion: that
"nothing they did mattered," which
perpetuated its own reality even when circumstances changed. Seligman's observation
was heretical--animals weren't supposed to adopt abstract, generalized
attitudes like helplessness.
Seligman figured that if depressed people
had somehow learned to be helpless, they could also unlearn it, but as he moved
from animal research into clinical psychology, he didn't just want to undo
negative thinking, he wanted to foster good feelings. He had a hunch that
people who consistently celebrated and exercised their strengths would be
buffered against inevitable bad times when they struck. This had worked for
Seligman himself: he'd learned to focus on his strengths, becoming a prolific
researcher and a popular writer. He also successfully used cognitive therapy
techniques on himself, learning to dispute "negative self-talk" and
to marshal reality-based data that supported looking on the bright side.
People, he contended, could argue themselves out of their black moods if they
took action. They just had to stick to it, dispute their knee-jerk negative
globalizations and catastrophizing, engage in "positive
self-talk," and do their homework in journals and exercise books.
The twists and turns of Seligman's
exploration have been distilled into a simple and elegant theory of the three
features that constitute happiness: the pleasant life, the good life, and the
meaningful life.He defines
the "pleasant life" as characterized by fleeting positive moods and
immediate experiences of comfort and pleasure. It can also be defined as the simple satisfaction of a mind and
body at peace. It can be amplified by learning to savor good moments and to
lighten up habitual patterns of thought. But in Seligman's scheme, the
"pleasant life" is the least important aspect of happiness, because
it depends heavily on an inherited positive temperament and on good fortune:
luck and genes. Simply enjoying the pleasant life doesn't build character or
resilience.
The second aspect of Seligman was ‘the good
life according to him it can be defined as part of happiness is anchored in
building a full life that goes well. It comes from exercising our talents and
virtues. what Seligman calls our "signature strengths"--and it
depends heavily on the ability to lose oneself in the earned pleasures of
sustained effort, absorbing work, conversation, accomplishment, contemplation, or
what calls "flow." To many people's surprise, studies in which people
record their mood states in daily diaries have revealed that most people feel
happy far more often at work than at home.
The third aspect of Seligman's happiness is
the "meaningful life," defined as the dedication of one's life to
something larger than yourself--something beyond
family and personal or intellectual achievement. Although Seligman rarely uses
these words, the meaningful life includes altruism and love.
Positive Psychology's massive public
relations successes may have encouraged millions to take a fresh look at their
attitudes and to think, at least fleetingly, about what really brings them
satisfaction.
Positive psychologist believe in
diminishing the irrational believes which we have, to express gratitude to
people you love whenever it is possible and to thank the supreme power the
little gifts of life like good health, parents affection friends etc. they urge
on looking on the positive side of life ignoring the negative. Sadaf Amjad
Positive
therapy
The aim of Positive Psychology
is to catalyze a change in psychology from a preoccupation only with repairing
the worst things in life to also building the best qualities in life. To
redress the previous imbalance, we must bring the building of strength to the
forefront in the treatment and prevention of mental illness.
The field of Positive Psychology at the subjective level is about positive
subjective experience: well being and satisfaction (past), and flow, joy, the
sensual pleasures, and happiness (present), and constructive cognitions about
the future-optimism, hope, and faith. At the individual level it is about
positive individual traits -- the capacity for love and vocation, courage,
interpersonal skill, aesthetic sensibility, perseverance, forgiveness,
originality, future-mindedness, high talent, and wisdom. At the group level it
is about the civic virtues and the institutions that move individuals toward
better citizenship: responsibility, nurturance, altruism, civility, moderation,
tolerance, and work ethic (Seligman and Csikszentmihalyi,
2000; Gillham and Seligman, 1999).
Psychology's empirical focus then shifted to assessing and curing individual
suffering. There has been an explosion in research on psychological disorders
and the negative effects of environmental stressors such as parental divorce,
death, and physical and sexual abuse. Practitioners went about treating mental
illness within the disease-patient framework of repairing damage: damaged
habits, damaged drives, damaged childhood, and damaged brains.
The message of the Positive Psychology movement is to remind our field that it
has been deformed. Psychology is not just the study of disease, weakness, and
damage; it also is the study of strength and virtue. Treatment is not just
fixing what is wrong; it also is building what is right. Psychology is not just
about illness or health; it is about work, education, insight, love, growth,
and play. And in this quest for what is best, Positive Psychology does not rely
on wishful thinking, self-deception or hand-waving; instead it tries to adapt
what is best in the scientific method to the unique problems that human
behavior presents in all its complexity.
However, does an approach
that focuses instead on teaching patients how to be happy offer an alternative
and more direct route to happiness? Certainly this approach has a strong
appeal, as demonstrated by the popularity of a course by Tal D. Ben-Shahar, a lecturer in psychology at Harvard, whose Positive
Psychology course, according to an article last year in the Boston Globe, enrolled over 800
students—more than any other course on campus.
Is
positive psychology an innovative way to find happiness faster? Or with its
claims, does it do a disservice to people with serious mental health problems?
According
to one of its most prominent proponents, positive psychology works. "I'm
an evidence-based researcher," said Martin E. P. Seligman, PhD, in a phone
interview. "In randomized controlled trials, we've seen good evidence that
the interventions utilized in positive psychology alleviate suffering and
increase happiness."
Seligman,
Fox Leadership Professor of Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania in
Philadelphia, helped develop positive psychology. He is the director of the
Positive Psychology Center at the University of Pennsylvania and a former
president of the American Psychological Association.
He
defines positive psychology, or positive psychotherapy, as an approach that
focuses on three areas: a pleasant life, an engaging life, and a meaningful
life. "Positive psychology is the study of what causes these to occur and
how to build them," he said.
In
an article in American Psychologist, he and coauthors
wrote that this approach as a treatment of depression "contrasts with
standard interventions for depression by increasing positive emotion,
engagement, and meaning rather than directly targeting depressive
symptoms."
In
a preliminary study, they reported, positive psychotherapy delivered to groups
of patients significantly decreased mild to moderate depression over a 1-year
period; positive results were also obtained in therapy with individual
outpatients who suffered from major depressive disorder. In informal settings,
they added, participants "not uncommonly reported [positive psychotherapy]
to be 'life-changing.'"
Positive therapy is a major
effective ingredient in therapy as it is now done, and if recognized and honed,
will become an even ore effective approach to psychotherapy.
it is a common strategy among almost all competent psychotherapists to first
identify and then help their patients build a large variety of strengths,
rather than just to deliver specific damage healing techniques. Among the
strengths built in psychotherapy are:
Courage, Interpersonal ,Rationality,
Insight, Optimism, Honesty,Perseverance, Realism,Capacity for pleasure, Putting troubles into
perspective, Future mindedness,
Finding purpose.
For decades,
many therapists have treated mental disorders such as depression with
medication and talk therapies that often concentrate on family relationships
and how they affect current problems. But some psychology experts worried that
this approach addressed only half of the equation -- focusing on negative
feelings, while ignoring the positives that help people feel happy. Now a small
but increasing number of therapists are employing an emerging discipline known
as "positive psychology." The treatment focuses primarily on the
affirmative aspects of a patient's life with the goal of helping them feel more
optimistic and fulfilled.
The new techniques often involve assessing a patient's
strengths, such as creativity or humor, and implementing them in everyday life.
The result can be small actions like taking a class or larger decisions like
changing jobs. The positive approach is being used with everyone from depressed
patients and anorexics to disaster victims and veterans returning from war with
post-traumatic stress disorder. Increasingly, people who have no mental illness
or disorder -- who function well but simply want to function better -- are
giving the upbeat method a try.
"It's great if you can increase people's positive
emotions, but this doesn't get rid of their negative ones," says Julie Norem, professor of psychology at Wellesley College in
Wellesley, Mass. "The important thing is that people learn to manage
them."
The technique isn't for everyone, positive
psychologists say. Patients with severe mental illness such as bipolar disorder
or schizophrenia will need help working through their
problems before they can learn to be positive.
"The main thing is to teach people to put more
positive experiences in their day, to appreciate and notice these
experiences," says Carol Kauffman, a positive therapist and assistant
clinical professor at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Kauffman says one of the many
places she uses positive therapy is her group for women with eating disorders.
After patients identify themselves and their disorder, Dr. Kauffman goes around
the circle again and has them name something positive about their lives.
"Now the bulimic says she is a senior at Radcliffe and won a prize and
really loves beauty," says Dr. Kauffman. It makes them feel
"empowered."
Positive therapy "is not about candy and
chocolates and vacations," says Dr. Rashid, who has a practice in Toronto.
"It's about working on your strengths, and there are no short cuts."
Viewing a person as
greater than his or her problems is the touchstone for effective therapy. There
are many models or types of therapy to choose from. Good Therapy does a
great job describing a very positive approach to therapy. These elements are
described below:
Non-pathologizing:
Viewing a person as greater than his or her problems is the hallmark of non-pathologizing therapy. It does not mean problems do not
exist, it means NOT viewing the problems as the whole person or the whole
person as the problems. Working non-pathologically does not negate pathology,
it depathologizes it. So for example, rather than
labeling a person who's angry as an angry person, non-pathologizing
therapy views one's anger as just an aspect of the person, but not all of who
the person is. We do justice to a person's true nature when we remember that
behind the layers of protection, no matter how self-destructive or hurtful to
others one has been, there is a lovable and vulnerable person at the very core.
Empowering:
Empowering therapists maintain the belief that people can grow, heal, and
transform. This hope is held no matter how intense one's defenses and wounds
are. People can heal if they want to and if they can contribute to their own
growth whatever is sufficient and necessary to that end. When a therapist views
a person as fundamentally flawed or incapable of change, the person is more
likely to feel and become flawed. Yet, one is more likely to discover one’s
true nature when therapy sees beyond wounds and defenses.
Collaborative:
The spirit of collaborative therapy is summarized in the words of Albert
Schweitzer who wrote, "Each patient carries his own doctor inside him....
We are at our best when we give the doctor who resides within each patient a
chance to go to work." Collaborative therapy can be established when a
therapist encourages a client to become the co-therapist. Therapists who work
collaboratively trust people to know themselves (or have the potential to know
themselves) better than anyone else, to access their own wisdom, and to attend
to their wounds. This orientation puts the client in the driver's seat of
therapy. Collaboration is not "directionless" nor does it put the
client at risk of further trauma.
Self:
Self is a state of being that a therapist can embody when with his or her
clients. It's defined by Richard Schwartz, Ph.D., as a state of calm,
curiosity, compassion, creativity, confidence, courage, connectedness, and
clarity. Self is considered a requisite of good therapy because it is this
state that allows a therapist to work collaboratively without pushing, without pathologizing, and without re-traumatizing.
Relationship:
Beyond technique and theory is the realm of the relationship: the ongoing
human-to-human connection which provides the foundation for change. The
relationship is the safe container which allows one to more fully and
completely feel the presence of Self while in the
presence of another. A therapist who embodies Self and
feels unconditional positive regard in the face of whatever the client may be
experiencing, nurtures the therapeutic relationship. Without a therapeutic
relationship there is no therapy.
Depth:
Therapy often times needs to go deep. There seems to be a split in the mental
health field between types of therapy which emphasize cognitive solutions and
those which emphasize emotional/ or body-oriented healing. Both are important.
Good therapy helps one to
process and complete whatever hidden and unhidden wounds one has harbored.
Treatment without going deep can be like stitching up a wound without taking
the bullet out; it’s more likely to remain sore, to infect, and require ongoing
attention.
“Enlightenment consists
not merely in the seeing of luminous shapes and visions, but in making the
darkness visible. The latter procedure is more difficult and therefore,
unpopular.” ~ Carl Jung
Criticism:
According to one expert, however, positive psychology
is at best a repackaging of standard approaches used by many psychologists and
psychiatrists, who focus on strengths and virtues as only one aspect of
treatment.
"Freud was interested in depth psychology, the
psychology of the deeper recesses of the mind," said Charles Goodstein,
MD, professor of psychiatry at New York University, in a phone interview.
"Positive psychology seems to be the psychology of the superficial. It
seems to be a form of education, of exhortation. For some people, it might be
beneficial to be the objects of an exhortation to be happy; after all,
ministers and preachers have employed this method for years."
But then again, there are some people who benefit, at
least transiently, from many kinds of psychological and psychiatric approaches.
The question is the treatment's long-term value: does it help promote true,
sustaining change in the individual?
"This is an approach that suggests people are
relatively simple, and I don't think that's accurate," he continued.
"It lacks an appreciation for the complexities of human personality. What
very often happens in psychology and psychiatry is the repackaging of old wine
in new bottles, but without an acknowledgment that it's old wine, and just
emphasizing the package."
Positive psychology, he said, carries "the
implicit suggestion . . . that everyone other than positive psychologists is
operating in the sphere of negative psychology. In the arena of popular
opinion, when the issue is framed this way, I imagine the positive
psychologists emerge smelling of roses."
That dichotomy is fallacious, he said.
"Psychiatrists and psychologists have been cognizant of the importance of
the 'positive' aspects of human personality. The notion that psychologists and
psychiatrists emphasize the negative is erroneous. When we work with symptoms,
our goal is to free the patient of the unconscious impediments that have
prevented them from using their positive attributes."
Positive Psychology is the scientific study of the strengths and
virtues that enable individuals and communities to thrive. The Positive
Psychology Center promotes research, training, education, and the dissemination
of Positive Psychology. This field is founded on the belief that people want to
lead meaningful and fulfilling lives, to cultivate what is best within themselves, and to enhance their experiences of love, work,
and play.
Positive Psychology has three central concerns: positive emotions,
positive individual traits, and positive institutions. Understanding positive
emotions entails the study of contentment with the past, happiness in the
present, and hope for the future. Understanding positive individual traits
consists of the study of the strengths and virtues, such as the capacity for
love and work, courage, compassion, resilience, creativity, curiosity,
integrity, self-knowledge, moderation, self-control, and wisdom. Understanding
positive institutions entails the study of the strengths that foster better
communities, such as justice, responsibility, civility, parenting, nurturance,
work ethic, leadership, teamwork, purpose, and tolerance.
Some of the goals of Positive Psychology are to build a science that
supports:
·
Families
and schools that allow children to flourish
·
Workplaces
that foster satisfaction and high productivity
·
Communities
that encourage civic engagement
·
Therapists
who identify and nurture their patients' strengths
·
The
teaching of Positive Psychology
·
Dissemination
of Positive Psychology interventions in organizations & communities
Positive
psychology is a recent branch of psychology whose purpose was summed up in 2000 by Martin Seligman and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi: "We believe that a psychology
of positive human functioning will arise that achieves a scientific
understanding and effective interventions to build thriving in individuals,
families, and communities." Positive psychologists seek "to find
and nurture genius and talent", and "to make normal life more
fulfilling", not simply to treat mental illness. This approach has created a lot
of interest around the subject, and in 2006 a course at Harvard University entitled "Positive
Psychology" became the most popular course that semester.
Several humanistic psychologists—such as Abraham Maslow, Carl Rogers, and Erich Fromm—developed theories and practices that involved human
happiness. Recently the theories of human flourishing developed by these
humanistic psychologists have found empirical support from studies by positive
psychologists. Positive psychology has also moved ahead in a number of new
directions.
Positive psychology
began as a new area of psychology in 1998 when Martin Seligman, considered the father of the modern
positive psychology movement, chose it as the theme for his term as president
of the American Psychological Association, though the term originates with Maslow, in his 1954 book Motivation
and Personality. Seligman pointed out that for the half century
clinical psychology "has been consumed by a single topic only - mental
illness", echoing Maslow’s comments. He urged psychologists to
continue the earlier missions of psychology of nurturing talent and improving
normal life.
The first positive
psychology summit took place in 1999. The First International Conference on
Positive Psychology took place in 2002. In June 2009, the First World Congress
on Positive Psychology took place.
Historical
roots
Positive psychology
finds its roots in the humanistic psychology of the 20th century, which
focused heavily on happiness and fulfillment. Earlier influences on positive
psychology came primarily from philosophical and religious sources, as
scientific psychology did not take its modern form until the late 19th century.
(See History of
psychology)
Judaism promotes a Divine command theory of happiness: happiness and
rewards follow from following the commands of the divine.
The ancient Greeks had
many schools of thought. Socrates advocated self-knowledge as the path to happiness. Plato's allegory of the cave influenced western thinkers who
believe that happiness is found by finding deeper meaning. Aristotle believed
that happiness, or eudemonia is constituted by rational activity in accordance
with virtue over a complete life. The Epicureans believed in reaching happiness through the
enjoyment of simple pleasures. The Stoics believed
they could remain happy by being objective and reasonable.
Christianity continued to follow the Divine
command theory of happiness. In the Middle Ages,
Christianity taught that true happiness would not be found until the afterlife. The seven deadly sins are about earthly
self-indulgence and narcissism. On the other hand, the Four Cardinal Virtues and Three Theological Virtues were supposed to keep one from
sin.
During the Renaissance and Age of Enlightenment, individualism came to be valued. Simultaneously, creative individuals gained prestige, as they were now
considered to be artists, not just craftsmen. Utilitarian philosophers such as John believed that moral actions are
those actions that maximize happiness for the most number of people. Thus, an empirical science of
happiness should be used to determine which actions are moral. Thomas Jefferson and other proponents of democracy believed that "Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" are inalienable rights, and
that it justifies the overthrow of the government.
The Romantics valued individual emotional expression and sought
their emotional "true selves," which were unhindered by social norms.
At the same time, love and intimacy became the main motivations for people to
get married.
General
overview
Some
researchers in this field posit that positive psychology can be delineated
into three overlapping areas of research:
1.
Research
into the Pleasant Life, or the "life of enjoyment,"
examines how people optimally experience, forecast, and savor the positive feelings and
emotions that are part of normal and healthy living (e.g. relationships,
hobbies, interests, entertainment, etc.).
2.
The
study of the Good Life, or the "life of engagement,"
investigates the beneficial affects of immersion, absorption, and flow that individuals feel when
optimally engaged with their primary activities. These states are experienced
when there is a positive match between a person's strength and the task they
are doing, i.e. when they feel confident that they can accomplish the tasks
they face. (See related concept entry, Self)
3.
Inquiry
into the Meaningful Life, or "life of affiliation,"
questions how individuals derive a positive sense of well-being, belonging,
meaning, and purpose from being part of and contributing back to something
larger and more permanent than themselves (e.g. nature, social groups, organizations, movements, traditions, belief systems).
These categories
appear to be neither widely disputed nor adopted by researchers across the 12
years that this academic area has been in existence.
The
undoing effect
In an article titled
"The undoing effect of positive emotions," Barbara Fredrickson et al. hypothesize that positive
emotions undo the cardiovascular effects of negative emotions. When people
experience stress, they show increased heart rate, higher blood sugar, immune suppression, and other adaptations optimized for
immediate action. If individuals do not regulate these changes once the stress
is past, they can lead to illness, coronary heart disease, and heightened mortality. Both lab
research and survey research indicate that positive emotions help people who
were previously under stress relax back to their physiological baseline.[16]
Elevation
After several years of
researching disgust, University of Virginia professor Jonathan and others studied its opposite,
and the term "elevation" was coined. Elevation is a moral
emotion and is pleasant. It involves a desire to act morally and do
"good"; as an emotion it has a basis in biology, and can sometimes be
characterized by a feeling of expansion in the chest or a tingling feeling on
the skin.
Broaden-and-build
The broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions
suggests that positive emotions (e.g. happiness, interest, anticipation) broaden one's awareness and
encourage novel, varied, and exploratory thoughts and actions. Over time, this
broadened behavioral repertoire builds skills and resources. For example,
curiosity about a landscape becomes valuable navigational knowledge; pleasant
interactions with a stranger become a supportive friendship; aimless physical
play becomes exercise and physical excellence.
This is in contrast to
negative emotions, which prompt narrow survival-oriented behaviors. For
example, the negative emotion of anxiety leads
to the specific fight for
immediate survival.
Strengths
and virtues
The development of
the Character Strengths and Virtues (CSV) handbook represents the first attempt on the
part of the research community to identify and classify the positive
psychological traits of human beings. Much like the Diagnostic (DSM) of general psychology, the
CSV provides a theoretical framework to assist in understanding strengths and
virtues and for developing practical applications for positive psychology. This
manual identifies six classes of virtue (i.e.,
"core virtues"), made up of twenty-four measurable character
strengths.
The introduction
of CSV suggests
that these six virtues are considered good by the vast majority of cultures and
throughout history and that these traits lead to increased happiness when
practiced. Notwithstanding numerous cautions and caveats, this suggestion of
universality hints that in addition to trying to broaden the scope of
psychological research to include mental wellness, the leaders of the positive
psychology movement are challenging moral and suggesting that we are "evolutionarily
predisposed" toward certain virtues, that virtue has a biological basis.
The organization of
these virtues and strengths is as follows:
1.
Wisdom
and Knowledge: creativity, curiosity, open-mindedness, love of learning, perspective, innovation
2.
Courage: bravery,
persistence, integrity, vitality, zest
3.
Humanity: love, kindness, social intelligence
4.
Justice: citizenship, fairness, leadership
5.
Temperance: forgiveness and mercy, humility, prudence, self control
6.
Transcendence: appreciation of beauty and excellence, gratitude, hope, humor, spirituality
Positive
experiences
Mindfulness
Mindfulness, defined as actively searching for
novelty, is also characterized as non-judging, non-striving, accepting,
patient, trusting, open, letting go, gentle, generous, empathetic, grateful,
and kind. Its benefits include reduction of stress, anxiety, depression, and
chronic pain.[20]
Flow
Flow, or a state of absorption in one's
work, is characterized by intense concentration, loss of self-awareness, a
feeling of control, and a sense that "time is flying." Flow is an
intrinsically rewarding experience, and it can also help one achieve a goal
(e.g. winning a game) or improve skills (e.g. becoming a better chess player).
Spirituality
Spirituality is associated with mental
health, managing substance abuse, marital functioning, parenting, and coping.
It has been suggested that spirituality also leads to finding purpose and
meaning in life.
Positive
futures
Self-efficacy
Self-efficacy is one's belief in one's ability
to accomplish a task by one's own efforts. Low self-efficacy is associated
with depression; high self-efficacy can help one
overcome abuse, overcome eating disorders, and maintain a healthy lifestyle.
High self-efficacy also improves the immune system, aids in stress management, and decreases pain. A
related but somewhat differing concept is Personal effectiveness which is primarily concerned
with the methodologies of planning and implementation of accomplishment.
Subjective
well-being (see also subjective life
satisfaction) is an
analogous term for emotional well-being or happiness elaborated by the positive psychologist Ed Diener et al. The article by Diener and colleagues "The Psychology of Subjective
Well-being" (2004) seeks to further legitimize the study of happiness or
well-being as within the reaches of science where previously it had been viewed
by many as rather a subject confined to philosophy or religion because these
subjects are considered somewhat abstract. Additionally, Snyder & Lopez
define subjective well-being in their text Positive Psychology (2007)
a tenet of theories of happiness in which "individual's appraisals of
their own lives capture the essence of well-being." According to Snyder
and Lopez consideration of different types of well-being (subjective,
objective, psychological, social, etc.) provides a more comprehensive
understanding of mental health.
Learned optimism:
The idea of learned
optimism was developed by Martin Seligman and published in his 1990 book,
Learned Optimism. The benefits of an optimistic outlook on are
many—optimists are higher achievers and have better overall health. Pessimism,
on the other hand, is much more common. Pessimists view bad events as permanent
and they believe that adversity they face is their own fault. Pessimists are
more likely to give up in the face of adversity or to be depressed. In Learned
Optimism, Seligman invites pessimists to learn to be optimists through learning
to think about reaction to adversity in a new way. The resulting optimism—that
that grows from pessimism—is called learned optimism.
Seligman came to the
concept of learned optimism through scientifically studying learned
helplessness, which is the idea that no matter what people do, certain often
negative events are still going to befall them. People who experience that
phenomenon continually learn to be helpless. As he was performing tests to
study helplessness further, he began to wonder why some people who were
conditioned to be helpless in his lab never actually became helpless. Some
subjects blamed themselves for their helplessness during the experiments,
whereas others blamed the experiment for setting them up to fail. Seligman
shifted his focus to attempting to discover what it is that keeps some people
from ever becoming helpless. The answer was optimism. Using his knowledge about
conditioning people to be helpless in the lab, he shifted his focus to
conditioning people to be optimists. The result of these experiments led to
defining the process of learned optimism.
Other differences
exist between pessimists and optimists in the areas of permanence,
pervasiveness, hope, and personalization.
•Permanence:
Optimistic people believe bad events to be more temporary than permanent and
bounce back quickly from failure, whereas others may take longer periods to
recover or may never recover. They also believe good things happen for reasons
that are permanent, rather than seeing the transient nature of positive events.
•Pervasiveness:
Optimistic people compartmentalize helplessness, whereas pessimistic people
assume that failure in one area of life means failure in life as a whole.
Optimistic people also allow good events to brighten every area of their lives
rather than just the particular area in which the event occurred.
•Hope: Optimists point
to specific temporary causes for negative events; pessimists point to permanent
causes
•Personalization:
Optimists blame bad events on causes outside of themselves, whereas pessimists
blame themselves for events that occur. Optimists are therefore generally more
confident. Optimists also quickly internalize positive events while pessimists
externalize them.
In a study completed
by Martin Seligman, Ph.D. and Gregory Buchanan, Ph.D. at the University of
Pennsylvania and published by the American Psychological Association, learned
optimism techniques were found to significantly reduce depression in a class of
college freshmen. As incoming students to the university, a survey determined
the most pessimistic students and they were invited to participate in the study.
They were randomly assigned, half to attend a 16-hour workshop on the
techniques of learning optimism, and half were the control group. In an 18
month follow up, 32% of the control group suffered moderate to severe
depression and 15% suffered moderate to severe anxiety disorder, whereas only
22% of the workshop participants were depressed and 7% had anxiety issues.
Those who participated in the learned optimism workshop also reported fewer
health problems over the 18 month period of the study than those students in
the control group.
A study done by Peter
Schulman at the Wharton School, published in the Journal of Selling and Sales
Management, looked to determine the affects of applying learned optimism in
business. After measuring the optimism levels of an insurance sales force, it
was determined that the optimistic sales people sold 35 percent more, and
identified pessimists were two times more likely to quit in the first year than
optimists. As a result of his studies, he recommends testing sales job candidates
for optimism levels to fit them to appropriate positions, training employees in
learned optimism techniques, and designing an organization overall to have
attainable goals set and good support from management.
Finally, a study
conducted by Mark Ylvisaker of the College of Saint
Rose and Timothy Feeney of the Wildwood Institute looked at children with
executive function impairment, meaning they have a brain functioning impairment
perhaps affecting motor skills, memory, or focus ability, and relating techniques
of learned optimism not to the children themselves, but to their caretakers,
who oftentimes are more likely to feel helpless than optimistic in regards to
caring for the child. It was found that learned optimism in caretakers of
children with brain damage actually led the children to develop more
functioning than children without optimistic caretakers. Optimistic
rehabilitation professionals can help to augment these results.
Learned optimism
techniques can be very practical to apply to anyone’s life, and are used
frequently today in the areas of parenting, business, and psychology.
Teaching children
learned optimism by guiding them through the ABCDE techniques can help children
to better deal with adversity they encounter in their lives. In addition to the
same value adults can get from learning optimism, if children are taught early
then the thought process of disputation becomes ingrained in them. They do not
have to focus on being optimistic, but rather optimism becomes automatic and
leads to a more positive life for the child.
Learned optimism is
prevalent in business because more optimistic workers are more successful
workers. Seligman’s focus in business is on “the personal wall” that is each
individual workers constant point of discouragement. This could be preparing
reports or making cold calls to potential clients. Putting the ABCDE model into
practice allows workers to respond to this “wall” with a readiness to conquer
rather than to feel dejected. Additionally, the ASQ—Attribution Style Questionnaire—is
often used to measure optimism of job candidates during the interview process
by asking the participant to write down causes for situational failures.
Participants then rank the causes based on given criteria, and this helps
businesses to know from the beginning whether the job candidate will be a high
or low performer in his/her projected role based on his level of optimism.
Learned optimism is
also a big tool used to combat depression during cognitive behavioral therapy.
Many people are depressed simply because they have a pessimistic outlook, and
using the ABCDE to change one’s beliefs about adversity. Rather than perceiving
adversity as a constant thing that cannot be overcome, and taking personal
blame for that adversity, patients come out of cognitive behavioral therapy
with the belief that they can control how they respond to adversity. A shift
toward optimism is a shift away from depression, and that is what makes
Seligman’s techniques so useful in cognitive behavioral therapy.
Hope
Hope is a learned style of
goal-directed thinking in which the person utilizes both pathways
thinking (the perceived capacity to find routes to desired goals)
and agency thinking (the requisite motivations to use those
routes)
Other
findings
· "A systematic study of 22 people who won
major lotteries found that they reverted to their baseline level of happiness
over time, winding up no happier than 22 matched controls"
· "Within a few years, paraplegics wind up only slightly less happy on average than
individuals who are not paralyzed"
· "[83 percent] of Americans report
positive life satisfaction"
· "In wealthier nations ... increases in
wealth have negligible effects on personal happiness"
· "Unlike money, which has at most a small
effect, marriage is robustly related to happiness.... In my opinion, the jury is still out on what causes the proven fact that married people are happier
than unmarried people." On the other hand, at least one large study in
Germany found no difference in happiness between married and unmarried people.
· Practical applications of positive psychology
include helping individuals and organizations identify their strengths and use
them to increase and sustain their respective levels of well-being. Therapists,
counselors, coaches, and various psychological professionals, as well as HR
departments, business strategists, and others are using these new methods and
techniques to broaden and build upon the strengths of individuals who are not
necessarily suffering from mental illness or disorder.
A
summary of the application of positive psychology to executive coaching was
presented by Dr. Anne Lueneburger, Managing Partner
of North Of Neutral, in CHOICE Magazine .
How
the positive psychology virtues and strengths are portrayed in movies, and how
individuals can use movie viewings for self-improvement or to help others, are
illustrated in a more recent book by Ryan Niemiec
from the VIA Institute on Character and
Danny Wedding from the Missouri Institute of Mental
Health entitled Positive Psychology at the Movies: Using Films to Build Virtues and
Character Strengths.
Positive
psychology research and practice is also currently being conducted and
developed in various countries throughout the world. In Canada, for example,
Charles Hackney of Briercrest College applies
positive psychology to the topic of person growth through martial arts
training, and Paul Wong, president of the International Network on Personal
Meaning [31], is developing an existential approach to positive
psychology.
Criticism:
Positive
psychology has been criticized by journalist Barbara Ehrenreich
for its allegedly non-scientific approach: "Evidence is thin. Statistical
significance levels are narrow. What few robust findings there are often prove
to be either nonreplicable or contradicted by later research. And correlations
(between, say, happiness and health) are not causations."
|
The Benefits of Positive Psychology.
|
Positive therapy
The
new and rapidly growing field of Positive Psychology is shedding light on what
makes us happy, the pursuit of happiness, and how we can lead more fulfilling,
satisfying lives. For many years, the field of psychology concentrated on
mental illness. Since Martin Seligman's landmark book, Authentic
Happiness, this new and exciting branch of psychology is focusing on the
good life, happiness, and well-being--what it is and how we can pursue the good
life with greater success.
Popular
psychology literature, often termed pop-psychology, reflects advice and
suggestions based largely on anecdotal evidence and the beliefs of the
individual author.
In
contrast, the science of positive psychology investigates potential concepts
with thorough and statistically sound experiments. Investigation results are
subject to peer review and stringent standards. Because of this,
recommendations and findings of positive psychology researchers are more likely
to be helpful and useable.
Many
of the concepts and ideas of pop-psychology may turn out to be validated by research
and concepts once dismissed may turn out to be of great value.
Positive
Psychology Studies
Positive
psychology researchers study the ingredients of the good life--happiness,
fulfillment, and life satisfaction. Their goal is to find those activities and
ways of thinking that characterize happy people. Can each of us be happier by
choosing how we think and what we do? The answer, happily, is yes.
Positive
Psychology Exercises
There
is no lack of self help advice available at dozens of Internet sites (including
this one), in hundreds of books, and through workshops presented by many
present-day gurus. Though most of the advice is sound, some is based on
personal anecdote and experience and may not be effective for most people. The
following three personal growth exercises are validated by scientific research.
Discover
life purpose
There
is a strong correlation between one's happiness and their sense of purpose or
meaning in life. These exercises are designed to help you find your own
personal sense of purpose and meaning. Any one of these may be sufficient, so
if the first one you pick doesn't work well for you, try another.
Recall
instances of great satisfaction and happiness. What were you doing? What were
the circumstances? What is the underlying theme, if any?
Recall
times when you've been occupied with an activity and lost all track of time.
Perhaps you worked through normal meal or sleep times without realizing it.
What were you doing? What talents were you using?
Start
with a blank sheet of paper or computer screen. At the top, write My Purpose in
Life is... Start writing whatever comes to your mind. When you write something
that evokes great emotion, perhaps even tears of joy, you've touched on a life
purpose that is meaningful and important to you.
Focus
on personal growth
Personal
growth and development is correlated with greater happiness. As with life
purpose, try any or all of the following exercises to identify aspects of
personal growth most important to attain personal growth :
Make
a list of your accomplishments over the past twelve months. Reflect on how
these accomplishments have contributed to your personal growth. Can you see an
underlying theme of personal development directions that is most satisfying?
Make
a list of the opposite, those accomplishments that were drudgery and left you
with little or no satisfaction other than that of completion.
Use
your unique strengths
Researchers
find there is a strong correlation between happiness and using one's strengths
in daily activities. Use one or more of these techniques to clarify your top
strengths:
Make
a list of those things you do really well. Combine and narrow the list until
you have only five or six of your top strengths. These are qualities that you
have used in moments of greatest pride and satisfaction.
Ask
people who are close to you what qualities they most admire about you.
Fill
out the VIA questionnaire here which provides an assessment of
your top five strengths. Compare these results with the above methods and look
for consistent areas. Discard any that you disagree with.
Now this paper will further discuss positive therapy, derived by
positive psychology discipline.
What is positive therapy?
Viewing a person as greater than his or her problems is the touchstone for
effective therapy. There are many models or types of therapy to choose
from. Good Therapy does a great job describing a very positive approach
to therapy that I very much agree with. These elements are described below:
(from www.goodtherapy.org)
Non-pathologizing
Viewing a person as greater than his or her problems is the hallmark of non-pathologizing therapy. It does not mean problems do not
exist, it means NOT viewing the problems as the whole person or the whole
person as the problems. Working non-pathologically does not negate pathology,
it depathologizes it. So for example, rather than
labeling a person who's angry as an angry person, non-pathologizing
therapy views one's anger as just an aspect of the person, but not all of who
the person is. We do justice to a person's true nature when we remember that
behind the layers of protection, no matter how self-destructive or hurtful to others
one has been, there is a lovable and vulnerable person at the very core.
Empowering
Empowering therapists maintain the belief that people can grow, heal, and
transform. This hope is held no matter how intense one's defenses and wounds
are. People can heal if they want to and if they can contribute to their own
growth whatever is sufficient and necessary to that end. When a therapist views
a person as fundamentally flawed or incapable of change, the person is more
likely to feel and become flawed. Yet, one is more likely to discover one’s
true nature when therapy sees beyond wounds and defenses. Some people may not
heal in this lifetime, but let the therapist not be an additional barrier to
whatever other obstacles may be presenting.
Collaborative
The spirit of collaborative therapy is summarized in
the words of Albert Schweitzer who wrote, "Each patient carries his own
doctor inside him.... We are at our best when we give the doctor who resides
within each patient a chance to go to work." Collaborative therapy can be
established when a therapist encourages a client to become the co-therapist.
Therapists who work collaboratively trust people to know themselves (or have
the potential to know themselves) better than anyone else, to access their own wisdom,
and to attend to their wounds. This orientation puts the client in the driver's
seat of therapy. Collaboration is not "directionless" nor does it put
the client at risk of further trauma.
Self
Self is a state of being that a therapist can embody when with his or her
clients. It's defined by Richard Schwartz, Ph.D., as a state of calm,
curiosity, compassion, creativity, confidence, courage, connectedness, and
clarity. Self is considered a requisite of good therapy because it is this
state that allows a therapist to work collaboratively without pushing, without pathologizing, and without re-traumatizing.
Relationship
Beyond technique and theory is the realm of the relationship: the ongoing
human-to-human connection which provides the foundation for change. The
relationship is the safe container which allows one to more fully and
completely feel the presence of Self while in the
presence of another. A therapist who embodies Self and
feels unconditional positive regard in the face of whatever the client may be
experiencing, nurtures the therapeutic relationship. Without a therapeutic
relationship there is no therapy.
Depth
Therapy often times needs to go deep. There seems to be a split in the mental
health field between types of therapy which emphasize cognitive solutions and
those which emphasize emotional/ or body-oriented healing. Both are important.
However, our experience is that healing takes more than insight about a
problem, cognitive countering, and surface behavior change. Rather than turning
away from, countering, or compensating for our suffering, healing requires an
exploration into the depth of the wounds which fuel extreme beliefs, feelings,
and behaviors. To counter and turn away from the deeper suffering is 'more of
the same' and often leads to more suffering. Also, healing requires feeling. As
it is said, “If we can feel it, we can heal it.”
Many of our extreme beliefs, feelings, and behaviors are
maintained because we have, in an effort to survive, avoided the painful wounds
and burdens which lurk beneath. Good therapy helps one to process and complete
whatever hidden and unhidden wounds one has harbored. Treatment without going
deep can be like stitching up a wound without taking the bullet out; it’s more
likely to remain sore, to infect, and require ongoing attention. “Enlightenment
consists not merely in the seeing of luminous shapes and visions, but in making
the darkness visible. The latter procedure is more difficult and therefore,
unpopular.” ~ Carl Jung
Good Therapy is Imperfect
The phrase “good therapy” encourages a misconception:
the idea that there is such a thing as pure good therapy, a process exempt of
any problems or issues. In the same way that a good marriage is not one without
problems, but rather one that works through problems – so is good therapy. No
therapist is perfect and no therapy can be provided perfectly, no matter how
ideal a therapy may be in theory. Even those of us who do the best we can to be
conscious of our inner world and attuned to the therapeutic process have
aspects we are unaware of, pieces of ourselves unhealed, and mistakes we
make.
Good therapy is the sum of all the experiences, internal and
external, occurring as a result of the imperfect psychotherapy process; and it
leads toward self-awareness, growth, and the release of extreme feelings,
energies, and beliefs. And what a blessing it is that even the best therapy can
be lined with areas of unawareness, mistakes, challenges to the therapeutic
relationship, and yet still turn out good…like a
marriage.
References
Gillham, J.E., & Seligman, M.E.P. (1999). Footsteps on the road to positive psychology.
Behaviour Research and Therapy ,
37, S163-S173.
Kirsch, I. & Sapirstein, G.
(1998). Listening to Prozac but Hearing Placebo: A
Meta-Analysis of Antidepressant Medication. Prevention & Treatment,
1, Article 0002a, posted June 26, 1998.http://journals.apa.org/prevention/volume1.
Maslow, A. (1971). The Farthest Reaches of Human Nature.
New York: Viking.
Myers, D.G. (2000) The funds, friends, and faith of
happy people. American Psychologist, 55, 56-67.
Peterson, C. (2000). The future of optimism. American
Psychologist, 55, 44-55.
Schwartz, B. (2000). Self-determination: The tyranny of freedom. American
Psychologist, 55, 79-88.
Seligman, M. (1994). What you can change and what you
can't. New York: Knopf.
SIDRA