POSITIVE PSYCHOLOGY
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. The emerging field of Positive Psychology is intended to complement, not to replace traditional psychology. By scientifically studying what has gone right, rather than wrong in both individuals and societies, Positive Psychology hopes to achieve a renaissance of sorts. This approach has created a lot of interest around the subject, and around 2002, college courses on positive psychology taught by Martin Seligman, Michael Frisch, and others arrived. Little attention was given by the general public until 2006 when using the same framework, a course at Harvard University became particularly popular.
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.
Current researchers in positive psychology include Martin Seligman, Ed Diener, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Christopher Peterson, Carol Dweck, Barbara Fredrickson, Sonja Lyubomirsky,[4][5] Kennon Sheldon, Jonathan Haidt, Shelley Taylor, C. R. Snyder, Robert Biswas-Diener, Albert Bandura, Charles S. Carver, Robert Emmons, Michael McCullough, and Phil Zimbardo. Each of these scientists has published influential and well-cited articles. Furthermore, these scientists are considered producers of high quality work outside of the positive psychology guild who publish in mainstream, top-tier psychology journals. This is important as positive psychology, in the end, is another topic in psychological science.
Contents [hide]
1 Background
1.1 Historical roots
2 Research
2.1 General overview
2.2 The undoing effect
2.3 Elevation
2.4 Broaden-and-build
2.5 Strengths and virtues
2.6 Positive experiences
2.6.1 Mindfulness
2.6.2 Flow
2.6.3 Spirituality
2.7 Positive futures
2.7.1 Self-efficacy
2.7.2 Learned optimism
3 Benefits in education
3.1 Hope
3.2 Other findings
4 Application
4.1 In education
4.2 Applications to Clinical Psychology
4.3 In the workplace
4.4 Other future research
5 Criticism
6 See also
6.1 Precursors to positive psychology
7 Notes
8 References
9 Further reading
10 External links
