Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide, Interventions and Policies to Enhance Wellbeing E-Book

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 1146

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2014

Beschreibung

Interventions and Policies to Enhance Wellbeing

Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide is the first multivolume, interdisciplinary exploration of the topic of wellbeing. The notion of wellbeing has grown in importance and prominence across the globe in recent years and this reference work provides an in-depth examination of the characteristics that enable individuals and organizations to thrive and flourish. Under the direction of noted academic Cary Cooper, and edited by a distinguished group of senior scholars from a variety of disciplines, this project looks at wellbeing from multiple perspectives, including children and families; the environment; the workplace; later life; economics; and interventions and public policy. Spanning the social sciences and encompassing the latest research, this is an essential reference for scholars, students, professionals, and policy makers who want to enhance and promote human wellbeing.

Interventions and Policies to Enhance Wellbeing looks at the most successful existing strategies to promote wellbeing and mental health. It examines the latest research in the science of wellbeing and discusses the practical implications for improved learning, creativity, productivity, relationships, and health. The first two sections cover interventions for individuals across the lifespan, as well as those for organizations and communities. The final section looks specifically at policy initiatives and approaches, with a focus on the integration of new technology and the role of the media. In this multidisciplinary volume, a cadre of global scholars considers a wealth of new research and outlines the potential impact on future policy and the wellbeing of society at large.

Online edition available on Wiley Online Library at www.referencewellbeing.com

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

Title Page

Copyright

About the Editors

Contributors

Full Contents of Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

Introduction to Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

The Volumes in the Series

References

Introduction to this Volume

Reference

Chapter 1: The State of Wellbeing Science

What is Wellbeing?

What is the Relationship Between Wellbeing and Illbeing?

Measuring Wellbeing

Beyond Measures of Happiness and Life Satisfaction: Wellbeing as a Multidimensional Construct

Managing the Multiplicity of Wellbeing Theories and Measures

Composite Measure or a Dashboard?

What Do We Know about the Causes of Wellbeing?

Interventions to Enhance Wellbeing

Policy Implications of Wellbeing Science

References

Part 1: Individual and Group Interventions across the Life Course

Chapter 2: Parenting Interventions to Promote Wellbeing and Prevent Mental Disorder

Background

Outcomes of Parenting

Determinants of Parenting and Risk Factors for Poor Parenting

Interventions to Support Parenting

Perinatal Programs

Parenting Support in Infancy and Early Years

Parenting Programs with a Focus on Children's Behavior

Interventions with the Most Seriously Compromised Parents

Common Findings

Approaches to Research

Developments in Parenting Support

References

Chapter 3: Promoting Mental Health and Wellbeing in Schools

Introduction

Methods

Results

Discussion—What Works?

Summary and Conclusions

Acknowledgments

References

Further Reading

Chapter 4: An Exploration of the Effects of Mindfulness Training and Practice in Association with Enhanced Wellbeing for Children and Adolescents

Introduction

Child and Adolescent Wellbeing

Child and Adolescent Mindfulness

Current Practice: Mindfulness-Based Programs for Children and Adolescents

Future Directions: Bringing Mindfulness and Wellbeing Research Together

Concluding Comments

References

Chapter 5: MindMatters

Introduction

Background

Theoretical Base of MindMatters

A Comprehensive Approach to Mental Health Promotion: The Inverted Triangle

Relationship between MindMatters, Mental Health Promotion, Wellbeing, Resilience, and Social and Emotional Learning

Phase 1 The MindMatters Pilot 1997

Phase 2 National Dissemination on MindMatters

Early Intervention—MindMatters Plus

Evolution in the Professional Development and Resources

Quality Management in Project Staff Selection

Evaluation of Efficacy and Effectiveness from Health and Education Perspectives

Evaluation Designs

The National Implementation Study of MindMatters (This section is based on the Evaluation Report, Hazell, 2005, used with permission)

Phase 3 The Current Phase of MindMatters

Conclusion

Key Positive Outcomes

Acknowledgments

References

Chapter 6: A Systematic Review of Mental Health Promotion in the Workplace

Introduction

Methodology of the Review

Summary of the Review of Interventions

Is Workplace Mental Health Promotion Feasible?

Call for Wellbeing Promotion in the Workplace

Conclusions

Acknowledgment

References

Chapter 7: Wellbeing Begins with “We”

The Need for Social Closeness Interventions

Types of Social Closeness Interventions

Interventions to Decrease Loneliness

The Role of Social Media and Electronically Mediated Communication

The Role of Personal Traits

Social Closeness in the Community

Conclusion

References

Chapter 8: The Experience Corps®

Introduction

Wellbeing in Later Adulthood

Overview of the AARP Experience Corps Program

The Conceptual Model

National Demonstrations of the Experience Corps Model

Findings from the Experience Corps Pilot Trial

Experience Corps Randomized Trial

How the Experience Corps Program Addresses Improved Wellbeing

Policy Implications

Conclusions and Future Directions

Acknowledgments

References

Chapter 9: Enhancing Mental Health and Mental Wellbeing in Older People

Introduction

Mental Health in Older People

Mental Health and Mental Wellbeing Among Older People: Social Determinants

Psychosocial Interventions: Enhancing Mental Health in Later Life

Concluding Remarks

References

Part 2: Interventions to Create Positive Organizations and Communities

Chapter 10: Wellbeing as a Business Priority

Introduction

Background

The Corporate Journey

Common Factors

Impact of Wellbeing Programs

References

Chapter 11: The Power of Philanthropy and Volunteering

Question 1: What Are the Effects of Giving Time and Money on Givers' Psychological Wellbeing?

Question 2: Where Do these Effects Exist? Do these Effects Exist Across Cultures?

Question 3: When, or in Which Circumstances, Do these Effects Exist?

Question 4: Who Benefits Most from Giving, and When Giving to Whom?

Question 5: Why Should Giving Time or Money Have any Psychological Benefits at All?

Question 6: What Next?

Acknowledgments

References

Chapter 12: Community Change

Introduction: The Balance Between the Individual and the Community—a Symbiotic Relationship

Ecological Thinking about the Wellbeing of Children and Families

The Value of Community Social Capital

A Sense of Belonging: Social Inclusion

Working Together for Community Change

What is a Community?

Complexities of Evaluating Community Interventions

Complexity of Outcomes

Research Design

Community Interventions

Summary

References

Chapter 13: The Health and Wellbeing Effects of Active Labor Market Programs

Introduction

What are Active Labor Market Programs?

A Gap in the Evidence Base

What Evidence is There?

ALMPs, Health, and Wellbeing

Conclusion

References

Part 3: The Policy Perspective

Chapter 14: Creating Good Lives Through Computer Games

Introduction

Psychological Wellbeing

Physical Wellbeing

Social Wellbeing

Wellbeing for People with Intellectual Disability: The Stomp Case Study

Conclusions

References

Chapter 15: Retooling for Wellbeing

Introduction

Background

A Rationale for Public Mental Health, Positive Psychology, and Media Action

Psychosocial Adaptation in Today's World

How Can Media Help?

Media can Influence Mental Ill-Health: Can it Also Improve Wellbeing?

Can the New Interactive Social Media Help?

Two Examples of Mass-Media Interventions From the United States and Kenya

In Closing: How to be a Media and Positive Psychology Expert

References

Chapter 16: Policy and Wellbeing

Policy and Wellbeing

How Did we Get to Taking Wellbeing Seriously?

The Coalition Government of 2010

The Policy-Making Process and the “Green Book”

Implications for Policy

Conclusion

References

Chapter 17: Measuring what Matters

Introduction: Why Measuring Matters

What Headline Economic Indicators Don't Tell You

An Alternative: Measuring Flourishing

Measures of Flourishing Versus Measures of its Drivers

Valid and Reliable National Measures of Flourishing

Effective Measures of Flourishing

Responding to Critiques of Subjective Wellbeing Measurement

Applying the Criteria: A Sketch and a Case Study

Beyond Subjective Wellbeing: A Framework for Measuring Progress

Conclusion

References

Chapter 18: Mental Health and Wellbeing at the Top of the Global Agenda

Making a Serious Case for Wellbeing: From Rhetoric to Measurement

Strengthening the Arguments for Wellbeing: From Economics to Sustainability

Wellbeing: From Communities that Thrive to Building a Sustainable Environment

Opportunities for Transformation: Challenges Ahead and Areas for Development

Conclusion: Global Traction for Wellbeing and Happiness

References

Chapter 19: How can Subjective Wellbeing be Improved?

Introduction

How can Subjective Wellbeing be Measured?

What has been Learned thus Far?

How can the Results be Used to Improve Policies?

Conclusion

Acknowledgments

References

Index

Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

Volume I: Wellbeing in Children and Families

Edited by Susan H. Landry and Cary L. Cooper

Volume II: Wellbeing and the Environment

Edited by Rachel Cooper, Elizabeth Burton, and Cary L. Cooper

Volume III: Work and Wellbeing

Edited by Peter Y. Chen and Cary L. Cooper

Volume IV: Wellbeing in Later Life

Edited by Thomas B. L. Kirkwood and Cary L. Cooper

Volume V: The Economics of Wellbeing

Edited by David McDaid and Cary L. Cooper

Volume VI: Interventions and Policies to Enhance Wellbeing

Edited by Felicia A. Huppert and Cary L. Cooper

This edition first published 2014

© 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Interventions and policies to enhance wellbeing / volume editor, Felicia Huppert; editor-in-chief, Cary L. Cooper.

    pages cm. – (Wellbeing : a complete reference guide; volume VI)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-118-60835-7 (cloth : alk. paper)

1. Health promotion. 2. Mental health promotion. 3. Public welfare. 4. Well-being. I. Huppert, Felicia A.

RA427.8.I584 2014

362.1–dc23

2013030512

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Cover image: © Ekely / Getty

Cover design by cyandesign.co.uk

About the Editors

Felicia A. Huppert is Emeritus Professor of Psychology and the Director of the Well-being Institute at the University of Cambridge, U.K. Felicia also has a part-time Professorship in the Centre for Positive Psychology and Education at the University of Western Sydney, Australia. She has been involved in the design and analysis of major longitudinal studies of wellbeing, and is currently engaged in interventions to enhance wellbeing, including the Mindfulness in Schools Project. She headed the consortium that has developed national indicators of wellbeing for the European Social Survey, and advises governments and organizations on the measurement of wellbeing.

Cary L. Cooper, CBE, is Distinguished Professor of Organizational Psychology and Health at Lancaster University Management School, U.K. He is the author/editor of over 150 books, has written over 400 scholarly articles for academic journals, and is a frequent contributor to national newspapers, TV, and radio. He is the Chair of the Academy of Social Sciences (comprised of 46 learned societies in the social sciences, with nearly 90,000 social scientists), President of RELATE, President of the Institute of Welfare, and immediate past President of the British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy. He was the Founding President of the British Academy of Management, Founding Editor of the Journal of Organizational Behavior, and is currently Editor-in-Chief of the international scholarly journal Stress & Health. He has received honorary doctorates from a number of universities (e.g., University of Sheffield, Aston University, and Heriot-Watt University). He has been awarded honorary fellowships by the Royal College of Physicians, Royal College of Physicians of Ireland, British Psychological Society, European Academy of Occupational Health Psychology, and Institute of Occupational Safety and Health. In 2010 Professor Cooper was awarded the Lord Dearing Lifetime Achievement Award at the The Times Higher Education Awards for his distinguished contribution to higher education. He was lead scientist on the U.K. Government's Foresight program on Mental Capital and Wellbeing, which had a major impact in the United Kingdom and Europe. Professor Cooper was Chair of the Global Agenda Council on Chronic Diseases in the World Economic Forum in 2009–2010. In 2012, HR magazine voted him the Fourth Most Influential HR Thinker. In 2001, he was awarded a CBE by the Queen for his contribution to occupational health.

Contributors

Saamah Abdallah, Centre for Well-being, New Economics Foundation, U.K.

Peter Anderson, University of Newcastle, U.K.

Jacqueline Barnes, Birkbeck, University of London, U.K.

Christine Burke, Bangor University, U.K.

David J. Cann, University of Cambridge, U.K.

Michelle C. Carlson, Johns Hopkins University, U.S.A.

Katarzyna Charzyska, Institute of Psychiatry and Neurology, Poland

Adam P. Coutts, University of Cambridge, U.K.

Czesław Czabała, The Maria Grzegorzewska Academy of Special Education, Poland

Marten W. deVries, Maastricht University, The Netherlands

Anna K. Forsman, National Institute for Health and Welfare (THL), Finland and Nordic School of Public Health NHV, Sweden

Barbara L. Fredrickson, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, U.S.A.

Kevin D. Frick, Johns Hopkins University, U.S.A.

Linda P. Fried, Columbia University, U.S.A.

Katherine D. Giuriceo, Johns Hopkins University, U.S.A.

Tara Gruenewald, University of Southern California, U.S.A.

David Halpern, No. 10/Institute for Government, U.K.

Trevor Hazell, Hunter Institute for Mental Health, Australia

John F. Helliwell, University of British Columbia, Canada

Helen Herrman, University of Melbourne, Australia

Felicia A. Huppert, University of Cambridge, U.K. and Centre for Positive Psychology and Education University of Western Sydney, Australia

Eva Jané-Llopis, World Economic Forum, Switzerland

Daniel Johnson, Queensland University of Technology, Australia

Catherine Kilfedder, BT, U.K.

Bethany E. Kok, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, U.S.A.

Sara Konrath, University of Michigan and University of Rochester Medical Center, U.S.A.

Paul Litchfield, BT, U.K.

Nic Marks, Centre for Well-being, New Economics Foundation, U.K.

Sylvia McGill, Retired, Greater Homewood Community Corporation, U.S.A.

Juliet Michaelson, Centre for Well-being, New Economics Foundation, U.K.

Melanie Nind, University of Southampton, U.K.

Jeanine M. Parisi, Johns Hopkins University, U.S.A.

George W. Rebok, Johns Hopkins University, U.S.A.

Sue Roffey, University of Western Sydney, Australia

William A. Romani, AARP Experience Corps, U.S.A.

Louise Rowling, University of Sydney, Australia

Charles Seaford, Centre for Well-being, New Economics Foundation, U.K.

Teresa Seeman, UCLA, U.S.A.

Eija Stengård, Pirkanmaa Hospital District and Tampere University Hospital, Finland and National Institute for Health and Welfare (THL), Finland

Sarah Stewart-Brown, University of Warwick, U.K.

David Stuckler, University of Oxford, U.K.

Penny Sweetser, Queensland University of Technology, Australia

Elizabeth K. Tanner, Johns Hopkins University, U.S.A.

Kristian Wahlbeck, National Institute for Health and Welfare (THL), Finland

Katherine Weare, University of Exeter and University of Southampton, U.K.

Peta Wyeth, Queensland University of Technology, Australia

Full Contents of Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

Volume I Wellbeing in Children and Families

Edited by Susan H. Landry and Cary L. Cooper

About the Editors

Contributors

Full Contents of Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

Introduction to Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

1 Introduction

Susan H. Landry

Part 1 The Development of Early Social and Cognitive Skills Important for Child Wellbeing

2 Children's Self-Regulation and Executive Control: Critical for Later Years

Caron A. C. Clark, Miriam M. Martinez, Jennifer Mize Nelson, Sandra A. Wiebe, and Kimberly Andrews Espy

3 Children's Emotion Regulation in Classroom Settings

C. Cybele Raver

4 Early Math and Literacy Skills: Key Predictors of Later School Success

Greg J. Duncan, Chantelle Dowsett, and Joshua F. Lawrence

5 Children's Intrinsic Motivation to Learn: Does It Decline over Time and, If So, Why?

Verena Freiberger and Birgit Spinath

Part 2 Parenting and Children's Development

6 Parents' Role in Infants' Language Development and Emergent Literacy

Catherine S. Tamis-LeMonda, Rufan Luo, and Lulu Song

7 Can Parents Be Supported to Use a Responsive Interaction Style with Young Children?

Susan H. Landry

8 Parenting and Executive Function: Positive and Negative Influences

Claire Hughes, Gabriela Roman, and Rosie Ensor

9 The Nature of Effective Parenting: Some Current Perspectives

Joan E. Grusec, Dilek Sarita, and Ella Daniel

10 Parenting and Early Intervention: The Impact on Children's Social and Emotional Skill Development

Catherine C. Ayoub, Jessical Dym Bartlett, and Mallary I. Swartz

Part 3 School and Child Care: Settings that Impact Child and Family Wellbeing

11 High-Risk Home and Child-Care Environments and Children's Social-Emotional Outcomes

Lisa S. Badanes and Sarah Enos Watamura

12 Classroom Peer Relations as a Context for Social and Scholastic Development

Gary W. Ladd, Becky Kochenderfer-Ladd, and Casey M. Sechler

13 The Importance of Quality Prekindergarten Programs for Promoting School Readiness Skills

Andrew J. Mashburn

14 Consistent Environmental Stimulation from Birth to Elementary School: The Combined Contribution of Different Settings on School Achievement

Robert C. Pianta

Part 4 Stress and Family and Child Wellbeing

15 Poverty, Public Policy, and Children's Wellbeing

Aletha C. Huston

16 Early Life Stress and Neurobehavioral Development

Sarah Stellern and Megan R. Gunnar

17 Neighborhood Effects and Young Children's Outcomes

Dafna Kohen and Leanne Findlay

18 The Family Check-Up: A Tailored Approach to Intervention with High-Risk Families

Anne M. Gill, Thomas J. Dishion, and Daniel S. Shaw

Index

Volume II Wellbeing and the Environment

Edited by Rachel Cooper, Elizabeth Burton, and Cary L. Cooper

About the Editors

Contributors

Full Contents of Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

Introduction to Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

1 Wellbeing and the Environment: An Overview

Rachel Cooper

Part 1 Wellbeing and the Neighborhood

2 Urban Neighborhoods and Mental Health across the Life Course

Erin Gilbert and Sandro Galea

3 The Impact of the Local Social and Physical Local Environment on Wellbeing

Anne Ellaway

4 Density and Mental Wellbeing

Christopher T. Boyko and Rachel Cooper

5 Neighborhoods and Social Interaction

Scott C. Brown and Joanna Lombard

6 Living in the City: Mixed Use and Quality of Life

Graeme Evans

7 “We Live Here Too”… What Makes a Child-Friendly Neighborhood?

Karen E. Martin and Lisa J. Wood

8 A Step Too Far? Designing Dementia-Friendly Neighborhoods

Lynne Mitchell

9 Walkable Neighborhoods: Principles, Measures, and Health Impacts

Tim G. Townshend

10 Quality of Urban Spaces and Wellbeing

Mags Adams

Part 2 Wellbeing and Buildings

11 Children and the Physical Environment

Lorraine E. Maxwell and Gary W. Evans

12 Wellbeing and the School Environment

Andy Jones and Flo Harrison

13 The Built Housing Environment, Wellbeing, and Older People

Rachael Dutton

14 Workplace and Wellbeing

Jeremy Myerson

15 Linking the Physical Design of Health-Care Environments to Wellbeing Indicators

Sarah Payne, Rachel Potter, and Rebecca Cain

Part 3 Wellbeing and Green Spaces

16 Wellbeing and Green Spaces in Cities

William Sullivan

17 Environmental Interaction and Engagement: Supporting Wellbeing

Richard Coles

Part 4 Wellbeing and the Environment: Other Factors and the Future

18 Crime and the Urban Environment: The Implications for Wellbeing

Caroline L. Davey and Andrew B. Wootton

19 Transport and Wellbeing

Nick Tyler

20 Air Quality and Wellbeing

Ben Croxford

21 Implications of Low-Carbon Design of Housing for Health and Wellbeing: A U.K. Case Study

Michael Davies, Ian Hamilton, Anna Mavrogianni, Rokia Raslan, and Paul Wilkinson

22 Cobenefits of Insulating Houses: Research Evidence and Policy Implications

Philippa Howden-Chapman and Nicholas Preval

23 The Multiple Pathways between Environment and Health

Marketta Kyttä and Anna Broberg

24 Summary: Wellbeing and the Environmental Implications for Design

Rachel Cooper and Elizabeth Burton

Index

Volume III Work and Wellbeing

Edited by Peter Y. Chen and Cary L. Cooper

About the Editors

Contributors

Full Contents of Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

Introduction to Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

Part 1 Introduction

1 Introduction: From Stress to Happiness

Peter Y. Chen and Cary L. Cooper

2 Conceptualizing and Measuring Wellbeing at Work

Cynthia D. Fisher

Part 2 Resources, Coping, and Control

3 Job Demands–Resources Theory

Arnold B. Bakker and Evangelia Demerouti

4 Positive Psychology and Coping: Towards a Better Understanding of the Relationship

Philip Dewe

5 The Role of Workplace Control in Positive Health and Wellbeing

Erin M. Eatough and Paul E. Spector

Part 3 Happy Workers and Happy Organizations

6 The Happy Worker: Revisiting the “Happy–Productive Worker” Thesis

Peter Hosie and Nada ElRakhawy

7 Organizational Characteristics of Happy Organizations

Bret L. Simmons

Part 4 Character and Wellbeing

8 Character and Wellbeing

Thomas A. Wright and Tyler Lauer

9 Stress, Health, and Wellbeing in Practice: Workplace Leadership and Leveraging Stress for Positive Outcomes

James Campbell Quick, Joel Bennett, and M. Blake Hargrove

Part 5 Organizational Strategies to Promote Wellbeing

10 Cancer, Work, and the Quality of Working Life: A Narrative Review

Tom Cox, Sara MacLennan, and James N'Dow

11 Lead Well, Be Well: Leadership Behaviors Influence Employee Wellbeing

Jennifer Robertson and Julian Barling

12 Organizational Coping Strategies and Wellbeing

Gordon Tinline and Matthew Smeed

13 Workplace Mistreatment: Recent Developments in Theory, Research, and Interventions

Michael Hanrahan and Michael P. Leiter

14 The Sustainable Workforce: Organizational Strategies for Promoting Work–Life Balance and Wellbeing

Ellen Ernst Kossek, Monique Valcour, and Pamela Lirio

15 Development of a Theoretically Grounded Model of Sexual Harassment Awareness Training Effectiveness

Lisa M. Kath and Vicki J. Magley

16 The Working Wounded: Stigma and Return to Work

Lori Francis, James E. Cameron, E. Kevin Kelloway, Victor M. Catano, Arla L. Day, and C. Gail Hepburn

17 Job Stress in University Academics: Evidence from an Australian National Study

Anthony H. Winefield

Part 6 From Research to National Policy

18 Longitudinal Research in Occupational Stress: A Review of Methodological Issues

Robert C. Brusso, Konstantin P. Cigularov, and Rachel C. Callan

19 Measuring Wellbeing in Modern Societies

Paul Allin

Index

Volume IV Wellbeing in Later Life

Edited by Thomas B. L. Kirkwood and Cary L. Cooper

About the Editors

Contributors

Full Contents of Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

Introduction to Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

1 Introduction: Wellbeing in Later Life

Cary L. Cooper and Thomas B. L. Kirkwood

Part 1 Longevity and Wellbeing

2 The Changing Demographic Context of Aging

Roland Rau and James W. Vaupel

3 Biological Determinants and Malleability of Aging

Thomas B. L. Kirkwood

4 Wellbeing as Experienced by the Very Old

Carol Jagger and Katie Brittain

Part 2 Factors Influencing Wellbeing

5 Psychological Wellbeing in Later Life

Kate M. Bennett and Laura K. Soulsby

6 Nutrition and Lifelong Wellbeing

C. Alexandra Munro and John C. Mathers

7 Physical Activity, Exercise, and Aging

Grainne S. Gorman, Josh Wood, and Michael I. Trenell

8 Capability and Independency in Later Life

John Bond

9 Combating Isolation Through Technology in Older People

Peter Gore

10 Wellbeing and Vitality in Later Life: The Role of the Consumer Industry

Michael Catt and Frans J. G. van der Ouderaa

11 Education and its Role in Wellbeing

Jim Soulsby

Part 3 Wellbeing at the End of Life

12 The Threat to Wellbeing from Cognitive Decline

Louise Robinson and Lynne Corner

13 When Vitality Meets Longevity: New Strategies for Health in Later Life

Rudi G. J. Westendorp, Bert Mulder, A. J. Willem van der Does, and Frans J. G. van der Ouderaa

14 Maintaining Wellbeing Through the End of Life

Julian C. Hughes

Part 4 Comparative Perspectives on Wellbeing

15 Cultures, Aging, and Wellbeing

Ngaire Kerse, Mere Kpa, Ruth Teh, and Lorna Dyall

16 Wellbeing in the Oldest Old and Centenarians in Japan

Yasuyuki Gondo, Yasumichi Arai, and Nobuyoshi Hirose

17 Wellbeing in Later Life in Eighteenth-Century England

Helen Yallop

Appendix

Foresight Mental Capital and Wellbeing Project: Mental Capital Through Life: Future Challenges

Thomas B. L. Kirkwood, John Bond, Carl May, Ian McKeith, and Min-Min Teh

Index

Volume V The Economics of Wellbeing

Edited by David McDaid and Cary L. Cooper

About the Editors

Contributors

Full Contents of Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

Introduction to Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

1 Introduction

David McDaid and Cary L. Cooper

Part 1 Perspectives on the Economics of Wellbeing

2 A Short History of Wellbeing Research

Laura Stoll

3 Income and Wellbeing: A Selective Review

Brendan Kennelly

4 Does Money Buy Me Love? Testing Alternative Measures of National Wellbeing

Arthur Grimes, Les Oxley, and Nicholas Tarrant

5 The Impact of the Great Recession on Economic Wellbeing: How Different Are OECD Nations and Why?

Lars Osberg and Andrew Sharpe

6 Was the Economic Crisis of 2008 Good for Icelanders? Impact on Health Behaviours

Tinna Laufey Ásgeirsdóttir, Hope Corman, Kelly Noonan, órhildur Ólafsdóttir, and Nancy E. Reichman

7 Mental Health: A New Frontier for Labor Economics

Richard Layard

Part 2 Promoting Wellbeing: The Economic Case for Action

8 Investing in the Wellbeing of Young People: Making the Economic Case

David McDaid, A-La Park, Candice Currie, and Cara Zanotti

9 Investing in Wellbeing in the Workplace: More Than Just a Business Case

David McDaid and A-La Park

10 Promoting the Health and Wellbeing of Older People: Making an Economic Case

A-La Park, David McDaid, Anna K. Forsman, and Kristian Wahlbeck

11 Promoting and Protecting Mental Wellbeing during Times of Economic Change

David McDaid and Kristian Wahlbeck

12 Making Use of Evidence from Wellbeing Research in Policy and Practice

David McDaid

Index

Volume VI Interventions and Policies to Enhance Wellbeing

Edited by Felicia A. Huppert and Cary L. Cooper

About the Editors

Contributors

Full Contents of Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

Introduction to Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

Introduction to this Volume

1 The State of Wellbeing Science: Concepts, Measures, Interventions, and Policies

Felicia A. Huppert

Part 1 Individual and Group Interventions across the Life Course

2 Parenting Interventions to Promote Wellbeing and Prevent Mental Disorder

Sarah Stewart-Brown

3 Promoting Mental Health and Wellbeing in Schools

Katherine Weare and Melanie Nind

4 An Exploration of the Effects of Mindfulness Training and Practice in Association with Enhanced Wellbeing for Children and Adolescents: Theory, Research, and Practice

Christine Burke

5 MindMatters: Implementing Mental Health Promotion in Secondary Schools in Australia

Louise Rowling and Trevor Hazell

6 A Systematic Review of Mental Health Promotion in the Workplace

Czesław Czabała and Katarzyna Charzyska

7 Wellbeing Begins with “We”: The Physical and Mental Health Benefits of Interventions that Increase Social Closeness

Bethany E. Kok and Barbara L. Fredrickson

8 The Experience Corps®: Intergenerational Interventions to Enhance Wellbeing Among Retired People

George W. Rebok, Michelle C. Carlson, Kevin D. Frick, Katherine D. Giuriceo, Tara L. Gruenewald, Sylvia McGill, Jeanine M. Parisi, William A. Romani, Teresa E. Seeman, Elizabeth K. Tanner, and Linda P. Fried

9 Enhancing Mental Health and Mental Wellbeing in Older People: Important Concepts and Effective Psychosocial Interventions

Anna K. Forsman, Eija Stengård, and Kristian Wahlbeck

Part 2 Interventions to Create Positive Organizations and Communities

10 Wellbeing as a Business Priority: Experience from the Corporate World

Catherine Kilfedder and Paul Litchfield

11 The Power of Philanthropy and Volunteering

Sara Konrath

12 Community Change: The Complex Nature of Interventions to Promote Positive Connections

Sue Roffey and Jacqueline Barnes

13 The Health and Wellbeing Effects of Active Labor Market Programs

Adam P. Coutts, David Stuckler, and David J. Cann

Part 3 The Policy Perspective

14 Creating Good Lives Through Computer Games

Daniel Johnson, Peta Wyeth, and Penny Sweetser

15 Retooling for Wellbeing: Media and the Public's Mental Health

Marten W. deVries

16 Policy and Wellbeing: The U.K. Government Perspective

David Halpern

17 Measuring what Matters

Juliet Michaelson, Charles Seaford, Saamah Abdallah, and Nic Marks

18 Mental Health and Wellbeing at the Top of the Global Agenda

Eva Jané-Llopis, Peter Anderson, and Helen Herrman

19 How can Subjective Wellbeing be Improved?

John F. Helliwell

Index

Introduction to Wellbeing: A Complete Reference Guide

Cary L. Cooper

Lancaster University, U.K.

This series of six volumes explores one of the most important social issues of our times, that of how to enhance the mental wellbeing of people, whether in the developed, developing, or underdeveloped world, and across the life course from birth to old age. We know that 1 in 4–6 people in most countries in the world suffer from a common mental disorder of anxiety, depression, or stress. We also know that mental ill health costs countries billions of dollars per annum. In the United Kingdom, for example, mental health-care costs have amounted to over £77 billion per annum, the bill for sickness absence and presenteeism (people turning up to work ill or not delivering due to job stress) in the workplace is another £26 billion, and the costs of dementia will rise from £20 billion to an estimated £50 billion in 25 years' time (Cooper, Field, Goswami, Jenkins, & Sahakian, 2009). In Germany, the leading cause of early retirement from work in 1989 was musculoskeletal disease but by 2004 it was stress and mental ill health, now representing 40% of all early retirements (German Federal Health Monitoring, 2007). In many European countries (e.g., Finland, Holland, Norway, and Switzerland) the cost of lost productive value due to lack of mental wellbeing is a significant proportion of gross domestic product (McDaid, Knapp, Medeiros, & MHEEN Group, 2008). Indeed, the costs of depression alone in the European Union were shown to be €41 billion, with €77 billion in terms of lost productivity to all the economies (Sobocki, Jonsson, Angst, & Rehnberg, 2006).

The issue of wellbeing has been around for sometime but has been brought to the fore more recently because of the global recession and economic downturn, which have made the situation worse (Antoniou & Cooper, 2013). But it was as early as 1968 that politicians began to talk about the inadequacy of gross national product as a measure of a society's success. In a powerful speech by Bobby Kennedy at the University of Kansas, when he was on the campaign trail for the Democratic Party nomination for U.S. President, he reflected:

But even if we act to erase material poverty, there is another greater task, it is to confront the poverty of satisfaction—purpose and dignity—that afflicts us all. Too much and for too long, we seemed to have surrendered personal excellence and community values in the mere accumulation of material things. Our gross national product, now, is over $800 billion a year, but that gross national product—if we judge the United States of America by that—that gross national product counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for the people who break them. It counts the destruction of the redwood and the loss of our natural wonder in the chaotic sprawl. It counts napalm and counts nuclear warheads and armoured cars for the police to fight the riots in our cities. …Yet the GNP does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country, it measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile.

University of Kansas, March 18, 1968,http://www.americanswhotellthetruth.org/portraits/robert-f-kennedy

Since that time there have been numerous studies to show that the wealth of a country is not related to its happiness (Cooper & Robertson, 2013); indeed, as you earn far beyond your means you may become less happy or content. More recently, we have had politicians like former President Sarkozy of France, Prime Minister Cameron of the United Kingdom, and the King of Bhutan extoll the virtue of gross national wellbeing; that is, that the goal of a nation's politicians should be to enhance wellbeing among its citizens, with gross national product being only one indicator of a country's success. Indeed, Prime Minister Cameron has instituted an annual assessment of this through the U.K. Office of National Statistics which measures wellbeing among a large sample of the U.K. population, publishing the results, highlighting concerns, and ultimately considering policies to deal with them. The World Economic Forum of leading global companies, nongovernmental organizations, international bodies, and global charities now has one of its Global Agenda Councils on “mental health and wellbeing.” Happiness and wellbeing indices abound (e.g., The Happy Planet), and many countries are being compared and assessed on a range of quality-of-life metrics. Indeed, in April 2012, 79 countries in the General Assembly of the United Nations signed the Bhutan Agreement, supporting the view that an overarching goal of a country should be to enhance the wellbeing and happiness of its people.

The biggest study of its kind undertaken by any government was the 2 year U.K. Government's Foresight project on mental capital and wellbeing, the aim of which was “to produce a challenging and long-term vision for optimising mental capital and wellbeing in the United Kingdom in the 21st century—both for the benefit of society and for the individual” (Cooper et al., 2009). Mental capital was defined as the metaphorical “bank account of the mind,” which gets enhanced or depleted throughout the life course (see figure). Mental wellbeing was defined as “a dynamic state that refers to individuals' ability to develop their potential, work productively and creatively, build strong and positive relationships with others and contribute to their community” (Beddington et al., 2008).

Figure. Synthetic View of the Mental Capital Trajectory.

Over 85 international science reviews were commissioned to assess the factors that influence an individual's mental capital and wellbeing throughout life, from early childhood to school years to working life to old age. There were numerous findings in this report, which were costed and developed as potential government policy and/or interventions. An example of some of the findings were: (a) if society does not catch learning difficulties in children early enough, there will be increased personal and economic costs downstream, leading to depleted mental wellbeing in terms of increased antisocial behavior as well as significant health costs; (b) if society does not identify the common mental disorders (CMDs) of anxiety, depression, and stress early enough, and provide appropriate treatment and support, society won't be able to tackle the 1 in 4–6 people suffering from depression and other CMDs; (c) with the workplace being more insecure, people working longer hours, and being more overloaded, occupational stress in many countries is now the leading cause of sickness absence and presenteeism, which has implications for the viability of businesses and their productivity; and, finally, (d) with the doubling of over-65-year-olds and the tripling of over-80-year-olds over the next 30 years, society needs to deal with the consequences of dementia now with preventative strategies, better early diagnosis, and more successful and evidence-based treatment regimes. The Foresight project developed many recommendations to enhance mental capital and wellbeing not only in the United Kingdom but also for other countries (Cooper et al., 2009), and its legacy has provided a roadmap for how other countries should think about this in the future, in terms of both policies and interventions for wellbeing.

The Volumes in the Series

Each volume in the series has a senior editor who is a leading international scholar in a particular field, following the life-course model described by the Foresight program. We start with Wellbeing in children and families and progress to Wellbeing and the environment, Work and wellbeing, Wellbeing in later life, The economics of wellbeing, and, finally, Interventions and policies to enhance wellbeing. The contributors to each of these volumes are distinguished international academics who work in the domain covered, reviewing the evidence that can help to develop policies and interventions to enhance wellbeing in that particular context.

In the first volume on children and families we explore four different themes, with a number of chapters under each of these: the development of the early social and cognitive skills that are important in child wellbeing, parenting and children's development, school and child care-settings that impact child and family wellbeing, and stress and family and child wellbeing.

The second volume is on wellbeing and the environment. This comprises sections, with chapters in each, on wellbeing and the neighborhood, wellbeing and buildings, wellbeing and green spaces, crime and the urban environment (and the implications for wellbeing), and wellbeing and the environmental implications for design.

The third volume highlights the issues of work and wellbeing. A range of topics is covered here: the impact of job demands, the role of workplace control, the organizational characteristics of “happy organizations,” leadership behaviors that influence employee wellbeing, the sustainable workforce, the “working wounded” (including stigma and return to work), organizational coping strategies and wellbeing, and many more.

The fourth volume highlights wellbeing in later life. Topics covered include the changing demographic context of aging, biological determinants and malleability of aging, psychological aspects of wellbeing in later life, nutrition and lifelong wellbeing, physical exercise and aging, combating isolation through technology in older people, the threat to wellbeing from cognitive decline, and maintaining wellbeing through the end of life, among others.

The fifth volume explores the economics of wellbeing, with chapters on income and wellbeing, alternative measures of national wellbeing, the impact of the great recession on economic wellbeing, whether recessions are good for one's health, investing in the wellbeing of children, investing in wellbeing in the workplace, promoting health and wellbeing of older people and protecting population mental health, wellbeing during an economic crisis, and many others.

Finally, the sixth volume highlights interventions and policies that can enhance wellbeing throughout the life course. There are three sections, with chapters on the state of wellbeing science, individual/group interventions on childhood and adolescence, promoting mental health and wellbeing in schools, mindfulness training for children and adolescents, interventions in working years and post retirement, mental health promotion in the workplace, intergenerational interventions to enhance wellbeing among retired people, interventions to create positive organizations and communities with wellbeing as a business priority, the power of philanthropy and volunteering, and creating community connections. Finally, policies are discussed, such as mental health and wellbeing at the top of the global agenda, how subjective wellbeing can influence policy, media and the public's mental health, and promoting wellbeing through new technology.

These volumes contain the leading-edge research, practice, and policies to help government, businesses, local authorities, and global institutions consider how we can action some of what Bobby Kennedy suggested were an important set of outcomes for a successful society. Our institutions need to change, and we as individuals need to do so as well, if we are to achieve personal wellbeing, or as Abraham Lincoln wrote during the American Civil War, “it is not the years in your life which are important, but the life in your years.” Winston Churchill reflected on this as well, when he wrote in an essay on how he dealt with the excessive pressures of life and found solace: “many remedies are suggested for the avoidance of worry and mental overstrain by persons who, over prolonged periods, have to bear exceptional responsibilities and discharge duties upon a very large scale. Some advise exercise, and others, repose. Some counsel travel, and others, retreat…no doubt all of these may play their part according to individual temperament. But the element which is constant and common in all of them is Change…a man can wear out a particular part of his mind by continually using it and tiring it, just in the same way as he can wear out the elbows of his coats…but the tired parts of the mind can be rested and strengthened, not merely by rest, but by using other parts…it is only when new cells are called into activity, when new stars become the lords of the ascendant, that relief, repose, refreshment are afforded.”

I hope that these volumes will provide you with the science, practice, and tools to enhance the mental wellbeing of people in your own work.

References

Antoniou, A., & Cooper, C. L. (Eds.) (2013). The psychology of the recession on the workplace. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing.

Beddington, J., Cooper, C. L., Field, J., Goswami, U., Huppert, F., Jenkins, R., …Thomas, S. (2008). The mental wealth of nations. Nature, 455(23), 1057–1060.

Cooper, C. L., Field, J., Goswami, U., Jenkins, R., & Sahakian, B. (Eds.) (2009). Mental capital and wellbeing. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell.

Cooper, C. L., & Robertson, I. (Eds.) (2013). Management and happiness. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing.

German Federal Health Monitoring (2007). Trends in causes of early retirement. http://www.gber.bund.de.

McDaid, D., Knapp, M., Medeiros, H., & MHEEN Group (2008). Employment and mental health. Brussels: European Commission.

Sobocki, P., Jonsson, B., Angst, J., & Rehnberg, C. (2006). Cost of depression in Europe. Journal of Mental Health Policy and Economics, 9(2), 87–98.

Introduction to this Volume

Felicia A. Huppert

University of Cambridge, U.K.

Centre for Positive Psychology and Education University of Western Sydney, Australia

Cary L. Cooper

Lancaster University, U.K.

In all the volumes of this reference work on wellbeing we have seen the enormous costs of a lack of mental capital and wellbeing in countries throughout the world. In the United Kingdom alone this cost was estimated to be well over £100 billion per annum throughout the life course (Cooper, et al, 2009). This work has highlighted the costs, issues, and challenges throughout the life course; for children and families, for the workplace, for communities, for the environment, and for the elderly.

In this final volume we explore in the first section what research has told us about the interventions that might be implemented to enhance wellbeing in childhood, adolescence, in schools, in communities, and for the elderly and retired. In the second section we examine the interventions that create positive organizations and communities. And in the final section we explore the policies that help to create the foundation stones for promoting wellbeing.

Our objective is to embrace the challenges of going beyond gross domestic product, which Robert Kennedy highlighted in his 1968 speech, when he movingly advocated the importance of the quality of our lives versus gross national product:

But even if we act to erase material poverty, there is another greater task, it is to confront the poverty of satisfaction—purpose and dignity—that afflicts us all. Too much and for too long, we seemed to have surrendered personal excellence and community values in the mere accumulation of material things. Our gross national product, now, is over $800 billion a year, but that gross national product—if we judge the United States of America by that—that gross national product counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear out highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for the people who break them. It counts the destruction of the redwood and the loss of our natural wonder in chaotic sprawl. It counts napalm and counts nuclear warheads and armoured cars for the police to fight the riots in our cities.... Yet the GNP does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country, it measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile.

University of Kansas, March 18, 1968, http://www.americanswhotellthetruth.org/portraits/robert-f-kennedy

This volume starts with an overview by Felicia Huppert of the kind of policies and interventions that we need to consider in enhancing wellbeing throughout the life course. From then on, we have collected an array of distinguished international contributors to explore what has been done to promote and develop wellbeing in a range of contexts. Alongside the interventions, we also explore the enabling policies and practices that governments, and global bodies, have developed to provide the platform for change to stimulate wellbeing. We hope that you will find much of practical value in this volume, mindful that change is not easy to create or implement. As Machiavelli wrote in The Prince: “It should be borne in mind that there is nothing more difficult to arrange, more doubtful of success, and more dangerous to carry through than initiating change.... The innovator makes enemies of all those who prospered under the old order, and only lukewarm support is forthcoming from those who would prosper under the new”. Yes, change is very difficult, particularly when the economic times are tough, but enhancing people's wellbeing is a worthwhile challenge that we should and need to embrace. Otherwise, as Mark Twain once colloquially wrote: “if you always do what you always did, you'll always get what you always got,” or as Proust more elegantly put it: “the only paradise is the paradise lost.”

Reference

Cooper, C. L., Field, J., Goswami, U., Jenkins, R., & Sahakian, B. (Eds.) (2009). Mental capital and wellbeing. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell.

Chapter 1

The State of Wellbeing Science

Concepts, Measures, Interventions, and Policies

Felicia A. Huppert

University of Cambridge, U.K. and Centre for Positive Psychology and Education University of Western Sydney, Australia

What is Wellbeing?

Wellbeing is a fundamental human goal—we all have a desire for our life to go well. The experience of life going well involves both feeling good and functioning well. Feeling good all the time would not be conducive to wellbeing, as it would devalue the role of negative or painful emotions, which play an important part in our lives when experienced in the appropriate context, such as sadness following misfortune, and distress or even anger following injustice. Some scholars define wellbeing in terms of positive emotions alone (e.g., Layard, 2005, 2011) or the balance of positive to negative emotions (e.g., Kahneman & Krueger, 2006). However, emotional experiences or “hedonic” wellbeing are only part of wellbeing, since emotions are by their nature transient, whereas wellbeing refers to a more sustainable experience. Sustainable wellbeing includes the experience of functioning well, for instance, having a sense of engagement and competence, being resilient in the face of setbacks, having good relationships with others, and a sense of belonging and contributing to a community. The functioning component of wellbeing is similar to Aristotle's notion of eudaimonic wellbeing, and a number of scholars have equated psychological wellbeing with eudaimonic wellbeing (e.g., Ryan, Huta, & Deci, 2008; Ryff, 1989; Waterman, 1993). However, the more general sense of wellbeing described here combines both hedonic and eudaimonic aspects. This combined position has been taken by a number of authors (Huppert, 2009; Keyes, 2002b; Marks & Shah, 2005; Seligman, 2002, 2011).

Some scholars use a very broad definition of happiness that is roughly synonymous with the combined hedonic/eudaimonic view of wellbeing described above. Sometimes this is termed “authentic happiness” (e.g., Seligman, 2002) or “real happiness” (e.g., Salzberg, 2010). The notion of happiness enshrined in Bhutan's Gross National Happiness (GNH) is another example of a very broad use of the term. In the words of Jigmi Thinley, the prime minister of Bhutan: “This ‘happiness’ has nothing to do with the common use of this word to describe an ephemeral, passing mood–happy today or unhappy tomorrow due to some temporary external condition like praise or blame, gain or loss. Rather, it refers to . . . deep, abiding happiness” (United Nations, 2012, p. 89).

Wellbeing can be used to describe an objective state as well as a subjective experience. Objective wellbeing refers to wellbeing at the societal level: the objective facts of people's lives; this contrasts with subjective wellbeing, which concerns how people actually experience their lives. As an objective state, wellbeing relates to the quality of outcomes for which a government or organization traditionally regards itself to be responsible; for example, education, health, employment, housing, security, and the environment. In this context, the term wellbeing is often used synonymously with welfare, the latter term emphasizing what governments do to improve objective wellbeing, as opposed to simply evaluating wellbeing. Used in its subjective sense, wellbeing refers to the way citizens experience their lives, which may bear a strong or only a weak relationship to the objective facts of people's lives. This chapter, and indeed this volume, is focused primarily on wellbeing in its subjective sense. As with objective wellbeing, we can examine its components and current state, and the variety of ways in which efforts have been made, or are being made, to improve it.

What is the Relationship Between Wellbeing and Illbeing?

Wellbeing versus the Absence of Illbeing

A senior civil servant in the United Kingdom recently made the encouraging comment that wellbeing is the core aim of all government departments. He went on to explain that since no department has the intention of making life worse for citizens, wellbeing must therefore be their goal. This comment reflects a classic misunderstanding of the relationship between wellbeing and illbeing.

Wellbeing is more than the absence of illbeing, just as health is more than the absence of disease (World Health Organization, 1946). Yet it is remarkable how resistant large sectors of the academic, practitioner, and policy communities are to recognizing the importance of positive wellbeing or of positive health. Many, if not most of the studies that purport to improve health or wellbeing in fact focus on symptom reduction, and their outcome measures usually do not even include assessment of positive feeling or positive functioning. Surprisingly, this is even true of the numerous trials using the Penn Resiliency Program undertaken in various parts of the world to increase social and emotional wellbeing in schoolchildren (Challen, Noden, West, & Machin, 2011; Gillham et al., 2007). The primary outcome measure has been reduction in symptoms of depression, anxiety, and conduct disorders. In the same way, school-based interventions to prevent bullying rarely go on to examine improvements in subjective wellbeing, interpersonal relationships or pro-social behavior. Likewise, work-based interventions too often assume that wellbeing will result from programs designed to reduce stress, but rarely do they evaluate increases in positive emotions, vitality, perceived competence, and the like. However, as contributions to this volume indicate, the situation is beginning to change, and increases in positive wellbeing outcomes are beginning to be measured in addition to decreases in negative wellbeing outcomes.

Unfortunately, resistance to prioritizing positive outcomes remains high in the field of health, including mental health. In the 1930s, a working group involved in planning a national health system for the United Kingdom wrote:

Health must come first: the mere state of not being ill must be recognised as an unacceptable substitute, too often tolerated or even regarded as normal. We must, moreover, face the fact that while immense study has been lavished on disease, no-one has intensively studied and analysed health, and our ignorance of the subject is now so deep that we can hardly claim scientifically to know what health is.

Political and Economic Planning (1937), p. 395

Sadly, within the medical profession the situation has hardly changed over the intervening 80 years, although some recent attempts are being made to conceptualize and measure positive physical health (e.g., Seeman, 1989; Seligman, 2008). One manifestation of this is the refocusing which has taken place within the American Heart Association, which now emphasizes cardiovascular vitality rather than cardiovascular disease. Within the mental health profession, an encouraging sign comes from the collaborative recovery model, where it is recognized that patients want to move beyond the absence of symptoms, towards feeling good and being fully functional (Oades et al., 2005).

Wellbeing as Positive Mental Health

The real developments in positive mental health, however, have come from non-clinicians, including psychologists, social scientists, and public health researchers, Jahoda (1958) is generally regarded as the first person to have promoted the idea of positive mental health, which she defined in terms of six elements of positive functioning: “attitudes of an individual towards his own self,” “self-actualization,” “integration,” “autonomy,” “perception of reality,” and “environmental mastery” (Table 1.1). In the 1980s, Ryff (1989) proposed six dimensions of positive mental health or “psychological wellbeing” that bear some resemblance to Jahoda's six elements of positive functioning: autonomy, environmental mastery, personal growth, positive relationships, purpose in life, and self-acceptance. Antonovsky (1987) coined the term “salutogenesis” to promote an interest in the development of health rather than of disease. Central to his concept of health is a “sense of coherence,” whereby life is seen as comprehensible, manageable, and meaningful. All three of these theorists view mental health and mental illness as lying along a continuum, with mental illhealth at one end and mental health at the other, although each has a different list of what they regard as the key components of mental health.

Table 1.1 Components of Positive Mental Health or Psychological Wellbeing.

Other wellbeing theorists do not explicitly refer to a mental illness/health continuum but can nevertheless be regarded as contributing to the body of theories about what constitutes positive mental health. Seligman, who initially regarded wellbeing (“authentic happiness”) as the combination of pleasure, engagement, and meaning (Seligman, 2002), has added two components in his more recent book (Seligman, 2011). These are relationships and accomplishment, which creates the acronym PERMA: positive emotion, engagement, relationships, meaning, accomplishment. For Ryan and Deci (2001), wellbeing arises from the fulfilment of what they describe as the basic psychological needs, and which they identify as autonomy, competence, and relatedness.

Although there is substantial overlap between these major theoretical approaches to psychological wellbeing or positive mental health, each scholar has their own preferred list of components. A recent paper by Huppert and So (2013) endeavored to derive a list of the components of psychological wellbeing in a more objective manner. They began by proposing a single, underlying mental health spectrum, with mental illbeing at one end and mental wellbeing at the opposite end. This meant that they conceived wellbeing not as the absence of illbeing, but as its opposite (Figure 1.1). To establish the components that comprise wellbeing, they examined the internationally agreed criteria for the common mental disorders (as defined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, DSM-IV, and the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, ICD-10) and for each symptom listed the opposite characteristic. This resulted in a list of 10 features which represent positive mental health or “flourishing”: competence, emotional stability, engagement, meaning, optimism, positive emotion, positive relationships, resilience, self-esteem, and vitality. And just as symptoms of mental illness are combined in specific ways to provide an operational definition of each of the common mental disorders, they proposed that positive features could be combined in a specific way to provide an operational definition of flourishing.

Figure 1.1 The Mental Health Spectrum. Based on Huppert et al. (2009).

Having an operational definition of flourishing makes it possible to examine the prevalence of flourishing within or between groups and the factors associated with flourishing.

One Mental Health Continuum or Two?

There is an alternative school of thought which proposes that mental wellbeing and illbeing are not at opposite ends of a continuum, but rather form two different continua. According to this view, it is possible to have both a serious mental illness, and be flourishing at the same time. The strongest proponent of the two-continua model is Keyes (2002b); one continuum goes from severe mental disorder to no mental disorder, while the other goes from low wellbeing (“languishing”) to high wellbeing (“flourishing”). This is a reasonable position to take in the case of certain chronic mental disorders, such as schizophrenia or personality disorder, in which there are undoubtedly times when the person may be feeling and functioning well, despite their clinical diagnosis. But it is argued by Huppert and So (2013) that this model is less convincing in relation to the common mental disorders, such as major depression and anxiety. Such disorders are common both in the sense that they are very prevalent in the population, and in the sense that virtually any member of the population may be diagnosed with one of these disorders at some point in their life. It is difficult to conceive how someone with a current diagnosis of major depressive disorder could be regarded as flourishing at the same time. Certainly in the course of recovery, when the person no longer meets diagnostic criteria, and is feeling and functioning better, they may move towards flourishing. Indeed it is encouraging that the recovery model now recognizes that for patients who have had a mental disorder, it is not sufficient to be relieved of their symptoms; rather, they want to be able to feel good and function well.

The fact that symptoms of mental disorder can coexist with some features of flourishing is not in doubt; it is the interpretation of this coexistence which requires examination. For example, in a representative population sample of over 6,000 U.K. adults, Huppert and Whittington (2003) created scales of both positive and negative wellbeing from the General Health Questionniare (GHQ-30) (Goldberg, 1972; Goldberg & Williams, 1988) and reported that there was some degree of independence between these measures. While the majority of people (65%) who had high scores on one of the scales (either high negative or high positive) had low scores on the other scale, 35% either had high scores on both positive and negative wellbeing measures, or low scores on both. There are at least two explanations for this finding, and similar ones reported by Keyes (2002a, 2002b), which do not require us to postulate a dual continuum model. The first concerns the timeframe over which the respondent is being asked to rate their experiences. In the case of the GHQ, the timeframe is “Have you recently . . .?” It is possible that a person could have recently experienced periods of despair or high anxiety, as well as periods of pleasure and positive functioning. In Keyes' (2002b) original paper on this topic, the timeframe for reporting wellbeing was one month, and the timeframe for reporting mental illness was the past year, so it is entirely possible that respondents had periods of mental illness as well as periods of flourishing. This does not constitute compelling evidence that illbeing and wellbeing can coexist at one and the same time.

The second reason why it appears to be possible for illbeing and wellbeing to coexist is related to the nature of diagnostic criteria and operational definitions. The diagnostic criteria for a mental disorder do not require that all the symptoms be present; likewise, the operational definitions of flourishing (Huppert & So, 2013; Keyes, 2002b) do not require that all the features of positive feeling and functioning be present. It would therefore be unsurprising to find an overlap between symptoms of mental disorder and features of flourishing. Thus it appears that while there is no dispute about the evidence of overlap between symptoms/features of positive/negative mental health, there is no necessity to postulate a dual continuum model, at least in the case of the common mental disorders.

Measuring Wellbeing

In 2011, the most senior civil servant in the U.K. Government, Gus O'Donnell, said in a speech about wellbeing “If you treasure it, measure it.” If we accept wellbeing as a fundamental human goal, and recognize that GDP and other indicators beloved of governments are just the means to that goal, we need to measure wellbeing—and we need to measure it well. This requires the use of subjective indicators to establish how people experience their lives and this, in turn, requires us to measure how people feel, and how well they perceive themselves to be functioning. So how good are our measures of wellbeing and what do they tell us about the causes of wellbeing and how to improve it?

The measurement of wellbeing has a long history, going back to at least the 1960s. Wellbeing measurement developed in the context of utilitarian economics (i.e., the idea that happiness was the greatest good, and that the aim of government should be creating the greatest happiness for the greatest number). This idea has much earlier origins in the philosophical writings of Priestley (1768), Bentham (1789), and Mill (1863/1972). However, it was not until the twentieth century that attempts were made to measure happiness. Since behaviorists were in the ascendance in the early part of the twentieth century, economists opted to measure behavioral proxies for happiness, such as consumption, since it was assumed that people chose to spend money on the things that brought them pleasure. Attempts to measure the feeling of happiness were regarded as being deeply suspect and, in principle, impossible. But as the cognitive revolution took over from behaviorism in the second half of the twentieth century, we witnessed the advent of measures of subjective wellbeing. The earliest, most influential of these is Cantril's (1965) Ladder of Life scale, which is still widely used as a measure of life satisfaction today (e.g., in the Gallup World Poll). The wording of the Cantril scale is as follows:

Please imagine a ladder with steps numbered from zero at the bottom to ten at the top. The top of the ladder represents the best possible life for you and the bottom of the ladder represents the worst possible life for you. On which step of the ladder would you personally say you stand at this time?