Systems informed positive psychology

Kern, Margaret L.; Williams, Paige; Spong, Cass; Colla, Rachel; Sharma, Kesh; Downie, Andrea; Taylor, Jessica Averitt; Sharp, Sonia; Siokou, Christine; Oades, Lindsay G.

doi:10.1080/17439760.2019.1639799

Cited by 130 publications

(151 citation statements)

References 43 publications

(37 reference statements)

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“…Here, we use the term “happiness” to describe feeling and functioning well across various domains of life. Others have labeled this concept as “wellbeing,” “flourishing,” “thriving,” or “optimal functioning,” with little consistency or consensus within or across fields (Kern et al, ). Across history, philosophers of various traditions have questioned the nature of and pathways to happiness, with little reconciliation (Kern et al, ; Kesebir & Diener, ).…”

Section: Conceptualizing Happiness Holisticallymentioning

confidence: 99%

CSR for Happiness: Corporate determinants of societal happiness as social responsibility

Chia

Kern

Neville

2020

Business Ethics: A Eur Rev

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110

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Over the past decade, societal happiness has increasingly been considered important to public policy initiatives globally, supported by interdisciplinary scholarly efforts spanning the social sciences, economics, and public health. Curiously, despite for‐profit corporations being core social institutions of modern societies, scant attention has been given to the social role and responsibilities of corporations in relation to societal happiness. In this article, we review and integrate research from positive psychology and related disciplines to examine happiness as a social outcome of corporate activity. We propose that corporations have a social responsibility to respect, preserve, and advance people's right to, and experience of, happiness—which we term CSR for Happiness. Within the existing literature, stakeholder happiness has generally been narrowly conceptualized in hedonic terms and has failed to consider the broader impacts of corporate activities on societal happiness. Drawing on advances in psychological theory and research, we provide a holistic conceptualization of happiness, which includes objective, subjective, hedonic, and eudaimonic dimensions of happiness. We offer an integrative conceptual framework, which includes the macro‐to‐micro and micro‐to‐macro pathways through which corporations directly and indirectly impact upon societal happiness. Finally, we consider implications of happiness research for the intersections of business and society.

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Section: Conceptualizing Happiness Holisticallymentioning

confidence: 99%

CSR for Happiness: Corporate determinants of societal happiness as social responsibility

Chia

Kern

Neville

2020

Business Ethics: A Eur Rev

Self Cite

110

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“…For example, the sustainability framework can benefit from the precise measurement tools used to assess wellbeing in positive psychology, whereas positive psychology can benefit from the contextual systems thinking inherent to sustainability science [ 2 ]. Moreover, a holistic integration of the sustainability perspective into definitions of individual wellbeing may also answer the call to use a systems approach in positive psychology [ 9 , 33 ]. Insights from both disciplines could help better define wellbeing in a way that includes the interdependencies occurring between people and natural systems [ 1 , 2 , 34 ].…”

Section: Wellbeingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Sustainable wellbeing is achieved when improving individual wellbeing is correlated with improving the wellbeing of other members of society and the natural environment. This holistic definition, which we term “sustainable wellbeing”, is compatible both with complex systems thinking [ 33 ] and with positive psychology and environmental sustainability (See Figure 1 ). Following this approach, human needs, societal needs, and environmental needs are considered interrelated and interactive.…”

Section: Wellbeingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Specifically, we recommend applying a set of ten rules based on Ronen’s [ 80 ] expansion of Kanfer and Schefft’s [ 79 ] six traditional thinking rules for therapists. The following sections develop and demonstrate these ten rules, using insights from both positive education and environmental education [ 33 , 82 ]. The proposed framework sets the grounds for implementing sustainable wellbeing literacy, guiding how to change thoughts, emotions, and behavior while striving for sustainable wellbeing.…”

Section: Positive Sustainability Education: An Integrative Approacmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Promoting Sustainable Wellbeing: Integrating Positive Psychology and Environmental Sustainability in Education

Ronen

Kerret

2020

IJERPH

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This article proposes an integrative policy approach to defining and promoting wellbeing through the joint lenses of positive psychology and environmental sustainability. The study suggests that while both positive education and environmental education address various aspects of wellbeing, a common definition is still absent. The study proposes a framework for advancing a mutual concept of wellbeing: “sustainable wellbeing”, integrating aspects of individual wellbeing and the wellbeing of the environment. Sustainable wellbeing is achieved when improving individual wellbeing is correlated with improving the wellbeing of other members of society and the natural environment. It suggests a framework for integrating the benefits of positive education and environmental education into a coherent approach for exploring, discussing, and experiencing sustainable wellbeing. The paper mainly develops, explores, and demonstrates ten rules for implementing sustainable wellbeing literacy in schools, based on cognitive behavioral therapy and positive psychology insights. It contributes to the development and understanding of wellbeing, highlights the benefits of parallel developments of two distinct educational fields, and offers practical guidelines for implementing educational programs. Furthermore, the paper contributes to developing 21st century educational systems and further develops the emerging field of positive sustainability.

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“…Interest in human wellbeing has occurred across millennia (Crisp, 2014), and while recent years have brought considerable interest and focus on wellbeing, there remains little consensus on what wellbeing is, with robust discussions occurring on how to appropriately define and measure the construct (Cooke, Melchert, & Connor, 2016;Disabato et al, 2016;Goodman, Disabato, Kashdan, & Kaufman, 2017;Kern et al, 2019). For our purposes here, we focus on subjective aspects, or how individuals perceive their life (Huppert, 2014).…”

Section: Links Between Personality and Wellbeingmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Qualitative Exploration of Individual Differences in Wellbeing for Highly Sensitive Individuals

Black¹

2019

Preprint

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Cultures explicitly and implicitly create and reinforce social norms and expectations, which impact upon how individuals make sense of and experience their place within that culture. Substantial differences in research findings across a range of behavioral and cognitive indices can be seen between what have been called ‘Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic (WEIRD)’ societies, and non-WEIRD cultures. Indeed, lay conceptions and social norms around wellbeing tend to emphasize social outgoingness and high-arousal positive emotions, with introversion and negative emotion looked down upon or even pathologized. However, this extravert-centric conception of wellbeing does not fit many individuals who live within WEIRD societies, and studies find that this mismatch can have detrimental effects on their wellbeing. There is a need to better understand how happiness is created and experienced by the large number of people for whom wellbeing manifests in alternative ways. This study investigated one such manifestation – the personality trait of Sensory Processing Sensitivity (SPS) – qualitatively investigating how sensitive individuals experience and cultivate wellbeing within a WEIRD society. Twelve adults participated in semi-structured interviews. Findings suggest that highly sensitive individuals perceive that wellbeing arises from harmony across multiple dimensions. Interviewees emphasized the value of low-intensity positive emotion, self-awareness, self-acceptance, positive social relationships balanced by times of solitude, connecting with nature, contemplative practices, emotional self-regulation, practicing self-compassion, having a sense of meaning, and hope/optimism. Barriers of wellbeing included physical health issues and challenges with saying no to others. This study provides a richer idiographic representation of SPS wellbeing, highlighting diverse pathways which can lead to wellbeing for individuals for whom wellbeing manifests in ways that contradict the broader social narratives in which they reside.

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Systems informed positive psychology

Cited by 130 publications

References 43 publications

CSR for Happiness: Corporate determinants of societal happiness as social responsibility

CSR for Happiness: Corporate determinants of societal happiness as social responsibility

Promoting Sustainable Wellbeing: Integrating Positive Psychology and Environmental Sustainability in Education

A Qualitative Exploration of Individual Differences in Wellbeing for Highly Sensitive Individuals

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