Positive Psychological Interventions for Children: A Comparison of Gratitude and Best Possible Selves Approaches

Abstract

Many studies have found benefits of positive psychological interventions, such as gratitude promotion or thinking about best possible selves, for adolescents and adults. Almost no research, however, has been conducted on the efficacy of such interventions for children. The authors' primary goal was to compare the outcomes of gratitude promotion and best possible selves interventions to a control condition, using a sample of elementary school-aged children (N = 62, ages 5-11 years). Children participated in once-weekly intervention sessions in which they were asked to draw a picture of something for which they were grateful that day (gratitude condition), a future version of themselves as happy and engaged (best possible selves condition), or something they had done that day (control condition). Analyses of the content of children's drawings indicated that children of this age were capable of articulating things for which they were grateful and positive future selves. Outcomes for the gratitude condition did not differ from the control condition; however, participants in the best possible selves condition showed greater gains in self-esteem than those in the gratitude or control conditions.

The Relationship Between Counseling Psychology and Positive Psychology

“…This is illustrated by several practice-relevant publications by US counseling psychologists in recent years (e.g. Conoley & Conoley, 2009;Magyar-Moe, 2009;Owens & Patterson, 2013). In the UK the impact of positive psychology on counseling psychologists has been minimal.…”

Positive Psychology in School-Based Psychological Intervention: A Study of the Evidence-Base

“…The control group did neither intervention but instead drew something that they had done that day. Results showed that, for the children in the gratitude intervention group, the intervention did not have an impact on self-esteem from the control group, but that the PP best selves intervention did show raised scores over the gratitude and control scores (Owens & Patterson, 2013). The authors explain that parents and teachers often promote the use of gratitude interventions with little empirical data to suggest its significance (Owens & Patterson, 2013, p. 420).…”

Self-Esteem and Anxiety Level of Students at the Technological Educational Institute of Athens–Planning of Interventions

“…Some authors argue that low self-esteem does not necessarily indicate poor academic performance [20] and that the positive effect of self-esteem on educational achievement is either small [21] or concerns mainly the ages between 7 and 15 [22]. However, a number of other studies have demonstrated significant positive correlations between good academic performance and high self-esteem [8,23,24] thus reinforcing the view that selfesteem is a source of academic achievement [25,26]. Although methodological differences among the above studies constrain the effort to integrate their findings, several studies support a reciprocal relationship between self-esteem, academic performance and anxiety [27,28].…”