Positive psychology experiments provided tools and techniques that continue to be beneficial for society.
Imagine being the 5th generation unemployed in your family. Half your friends don’t work and most of the rest are in low paid, dead end jobs. School was a struggle, you don’t have any qualifications–what’s the point of applying for a job? Now they say to get your benefit, you have to go on a course to “motivate you.” So you go along, depressed, annoyed and resistant…
The challenge for us was to create a course to raise aspirations and get people to take the first step towards positive change with limited time and budget. So we examined existing research that could easily be translated into practical and effective exercises for this audience, many of whom had literacy problems.
Although the jobless of East Durham did not quite match the “WEIRD” (western, educated, industrialised, rich and democratic) participants in many of the experiments, it was a start.
Useful Research
One study that proved particularly useful was Richard Wiseman’s research into luck (Wiseman, 2004). Wiseman studied people who were exceptionally lucky and unlucky; gathering information by interviewing them, testing personality traits across 5 dimensions, examining how the two groups reacted to adverse events and how they made decisions.
He discovered that on purely random events (such as choosing lottery numbers) there was no difference; but in other areas, there was a significant difference. Lucky people constantly encounter chance opportunities, make good decisions without knowing why, have their ambitions come true and can turn bad luck into good.
He found 4 key principles to which lucky people adhered and by teaching them to others, he transformed lives.
The idea was easy to explain to our audience, as the exercises were easily replicated and the premise appealed to our audience.
Many of Wiseman’s findings were echoed in experiments and works by other positive psychologists such as Martin Seligman (Seligman, 2006) and Barbara Fredrickson (Fredrickson, 2009), as well as research into successful organisations (Patterson, Grenny, McMillan & Switzler, 2002) and we incorporated these into the programme too.
Finding each individual’s key strengths Peterson, C. & Seligman, M.E.P (2004) at the start of the programme made people value themselves and feel they had the ability to improve their situation. Asking our participants what their strengths were resulted in a universal and resounding “nowt”.
We used a simple questionnaire of 48 questions related to the 24 VIA strengths (Authentic Happiness, 2015) that could be read aloud and administered in 10 minutes. The choice of reading aloud was for two reasons—many of the participants had difficulty with reading and secondly, which allowed us to pace the questions so that people responded without over thinking.
Results
To assess the effectiveness of the programme, we initially used the Confidence Research System of the Centre for Confidence in Glasgow to administer standard questionnaires pre and post course and to compare our data with their large database.
The questionnaires used were Rosenberg’s Self-Esteem Scale (Rosenberg, 1965), The Ego-Resilience Scale (Block, J. & Kremen, A., 1996); Theories of Intelligence Scale – Self (Mindset (Dweck, C.S., Chiu, C. & Hong,Y., 1995); and The General self-efficacy scale (Schwarzer, R. & Jerusalem, M., 1995).
Data collected showed significant change in self esteem, resilience and self-efficacy. As our clients complained about the time and energy required to complete 4 questionnaires before and after, we changed to a simpler measure, the Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Well-being Scale (Tennant, R.,Hiller, L., Fishwick, R., Platt, S., Joseph, S., Weich, S., Parkinson, J., Secker, J. & Stewar-Brown, S., 2007).
So in less than a year, several hundred people in East Durham benefited from Possibility Place, based on positive psychology experiments. The course is still running and was the basis for similar courses being used for pre-release prisoners and parents.
Bibliography
Block, J. & Kremen, A. (1996). IQ and Ego-Resiliency: Conceptual and Empirical Connections and Separateness. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 349-361.
Dweck, C.S., Chiu, C. & Hong,Y. (1995). Implicit Theories and their role in judgements and reactions: A world from two perspectives. Psychological Inquiry, 267-285.
Fredrickson, B. (2009). Positivity. New York: Three Rivers Press, Random House.
Haidt, J. (2012). The righteous mind: Why good people are divided by politics and religion. New York: Pantheon Books.
Patterson, K., Grenny, J., McMillan, R., & Switzler, A. (2002). Crucial Conversations. New York: McGraw Hill.
Peterson, C. & Seligman, M.E.P. (2004). Character strengths and virtues: A handbook and classification. New York/Washington DC: Oxford University Press/Americal Psychological Associaton.
Rosenberg, M. (1965). Society and the adolescent self-image. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Schwarzer, R. & Jerusalem, M. (1995). Generalised Self-Efficacy Scale. In J. W. Weinman, Measures in health psychology: A user’s portfolio. Causal and Control Beliefs (pp. 35-37). Windsor, England: NFER-NELSON.
Seligman, M. (2006). Learned optimism: How to change your mind and your life. New York: Vintage Books.
Tennant, R.,Hiller, L., Fishwick, R., Platt, S., Joseph, S., Weich, S., Parkinson, J., Secker, J. & Stewar-Brown, S. (2007, November 27). Research The Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Well-being Scale (WEMWBS):. Retrieved from Health and Quality of Life Outcomes: http://www.hqlo.com/content/pdf/1477-7525-5-63.pdf
The Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania. . (2015, September 4). Questionnaire Centre. Retrieved from Authentic Happiness: https://www.authentichappiness.sas.upenn.edu/testcenter
Wiseman, R. (2004). The Luck Factor. London: Arrow Books.
This article has been written by Nancy Radford.
Prior to setting Roundtuit, Nancy worked as a nurse, midwife and researcher in the health sector, was a director of a quick print firm, and a manager in charities and a private firm.
Roundtuit works with SMEs and third sector organisations to become financial viable without losing their values or sense of humour.
As a “third culture kid”, she is comfortable with religious, national and cultural differences and sensitivities, enabling mutual understanding.
As a qualified coach, facilitator and mediator, she uses her experience, combined with techniques and tools based on research in behavioural science and psychology to rebuild trust and relationships.
Nancy particularly enjoys mediating or facilitating change in difficult and emotional situations by giving people tools to handle clashing values or conflicts of interest in a constructive way. www.roundtuit.me.uk
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