The truth about strengths-based practice: Not a new paradigm for recreational therapy—But an important one

2017 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. 19
Author(s):  
David R. Austin, PhD, FDRT, FALS ◽  
Bryan P. McCormick, PhD, CTRS, FDRT, FALS
Keyword(s):  
Full Range ◽  
Medical Model ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Humanistic Psychology ◽  
Recreational Therapy ◽  
New Paradigm ◽  
Dual Roles ◽  
Optimal Functioning ◽  
Human Functioning ◽  
Client Strengths

Although Heyne and Anderson have offered their strengths-based approach as a sea change in the practice of recreational therapy, there is compelling evidence that the strengths-based approach has existed within recreational therapy for some time. In fact, recreational therapists should take pride in being among the early adopters of the strengths-based approach. Recreational therapy’s foundation in humanistic psychology, and subsequently in positive psychology, has always provided an orientation to practice in which therapists were encouraged to focus on client strengths and resources. In addition, the authors argue that Heyne and Anderson’s exclusive focus on strengths, to the neglect of client problems and concerns, does not represent the entire spectrum served by recreational therapists. Further, Heyne and Anderson have inaccurately characterized recreational therapists as following a medical model, which emphasizes only client problems or health conditions. Further, they erroneously portray recreational therapists as exerting dominance over clients. This representation is simply not in keeping with practices in recreational therapy. The authors suggest that Heyne and Anderson should be applauded for bringing attention to the importance of recreational therapists focusing on using a strengths-based approach to assist clients to move toward the achievement of optimal functioning and well-being. In doing so, however, they have failed to acknowledge that recreational therapists work along the full range of human functioning that includes helping clients to alleviate problems at one end of the spectrum to the promotion of optimal functioning at the other end. The roles of alleviating client health problems and issues and the promoting of optimal functioning are dual roles that recreational therapists do and should take.

Positive Psychology Applications

2009 ◽  
pp. 34-48 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. Alex Linley ◽  
Stephen Joseph ◽  
John Maltby ◽  
Susan Harrington ◽  
Alex M. Wood
Keyword(s):  
Positive Psychology ◽  
Organizational Behavior ◽  
Employee Engagement ◽  
Medical Model ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Humanistic Psychology ◽  
Human Needs ◽  
Organizational Scholarship ◽  
Client Centered Therapy ◽  
Good Lives

Applied positive psychology is concerned with facilitating good lives and enabling people to be at their best. It is as much an approach as a particular domain of inquiry. As shown throughout this chapter, positive psychology has applications that span almost every area of applied psychology and beyond. In clinical psychology, counseling and psychotherapy, applied positive psychology builds on the traditions of humanistic psychology and Carl Rogers' client-centered therapy. It challenges the dominant assumptions of the medical model and promotes a dimensional, rather than dichotomous, understanding of mental health and mental illness. Beyond the alleviation of psychopathology, applied positive psychology has also seen the development of specific happiness-increase interventions, including counting one's blessings, using signature strengths, and paying a gratitude visit. In education, applied positive psychology has been used to promote flow in the classroom, as well as harnessing children's strengths to aid their learning and development. Forensic applications of positive psychology are represented by the good lives model of offender management, which focuses on the adaptive satisfaction of human needs. In Industrial Organizational (I/O) psychology, positive psychology applications are represented throughout work on transformational leadership, employee engagement, positive organizational scholarship, positive organizational behavior, appreciative inquiry, and strengths-based organization. In society, more broadly, applied positive psychology is shown to influence the development of life coaching and the practice of executive coaching, while population approaches are being explored in relation to epidemiology and the promotion of social well-being. Having reviewed these diverse areas, the chapter then goes on to consider the theoretical basis for applied positive psychology; the questions of who should apply positive psychology, as well as where and how; and whether positive psychology applications could be universally relevant. The chapter concludes by considering what the future of applied positive psychology may hold and suggesting that the discipline has the potential to impact positively on people throughout the world.

The Unique Contribution of Positive Orientation to Optimal Functioning

2012 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 44-54 ◽  
Author(s):  
Guido Alessandri ◽  
Gian Vittorio Caprara ◽  
John Tisak
Keyword(s):  
Psychological Functioning ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Unique Contribution ◽  
Critical Component ◽  
Positive Orientation ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Common Mode ◽  
Optimal Functioning

Literature documents that the judgments people hold about themselves, their life, and their future are important ingredients of their psychological functioning and well-being, and are commonly related to each other. In this paper, results from a large cross-sectional sample (N = 1,331, 48% males) are presented attesting to the hypothesis that evaluations about oneself, one’s life, and one’s future rest on a common mode of viewing experiences named “Positive Orientation.” These results corroborate the utility of the new construct as a critical component of individuals’ well functioning.

scholarly journals Lexeme Glück in German Dictionaries of the 16th — 19th Centuries: Lexicographic Representation and Interpretation of Its Conceptual Content

2021 ◽  
pp. 9-22
Author(s):  
Andrey Ivanov ◽  
◽  
Rimma Ivanova ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Social Life ◽  
Semantic Analysis ◽  
18Th Century ◽  
Full Range ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Spiritual Needs ◽  
Semantic Structure ◽  
Middle High German ◽  
13Th Century ◽  
Gradual Evolution

The article discusses the concept “happiness” as represented and interpreted in lexicography. The aim of the study is to compare existing theories about the origin of the word Glück, to trace the development of its semantics from one generalized meaning to a set of meanings that reflects a gradual evolution of people’s ideas about happiness, and to identify ways of representing these ideas by lexicographic means. Using methods of historical-linguistic, compara-tive, etymological, definitional, and semantic analysis, the authors examine German dictionaries and lexicons published in the period from 1513 to 1888 and establish that in those four centuries the concept “happiness,” represented in the German vocabulary by the lexeme Glück, underwent significant transformation, as material and spiritual needs of people kept changing against the background of gradual humanization of their social life, which, in its turn, led to added complexity in the semantic structure of the lexeme Glück that embodies this concept. Descriptions of the lexeme Glück in dictionaries dating from the beginning of the 16th to mid-18th century are very concise due to the type of these dictionaries (nomenclators, translated dictionaries) and do not involve detailed comments on the full range of meanings that the lexeme had. The main elements of the semantic structure of the lexeme are ‘(temporary) well-being,’ ‘bliss,’ ‘luc ,’ and ‘fortune (fate)’ (glu c fall, glu c elig eit, wol tand, zeit-liche Wolfart). Analyzing interpretations of the lexeme Glück in the mid-18th — late 19th century dictionaries, the authors conclude that the semantic structure of the lexeme became more complicated due to philosophical rethinking of the concept and its integrated dissemination through dictionaries. The etymology of the word Glüc is still unclear. It is assumed that the word appeared in the 13th century and retained a neutral meaning until the end of the Middle High German period when a positive connotation began to prevail in the semantics of the word.

scholarly journals Microdosing Psychedelics: Personality, mental health, and creativity differences in microdosers

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Anderson ◽  
Rotem Petranker ◽  
Daniel Rosenbaum ◽  
Cory Weissman ◽  
Le-Anh Dinh-Williams ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Dysfunctional Attitudes ◽  
Online Forums ◽  
New Paradigm ◽  
Full Dose ◽  
Regular Consumption ◽  
Exciting Potential ◽  
Clinical Benefits ◽  
Mental Well Being

Microdosing psychedelics - the regular consumption of small amounts of psychedelic substances such as LSD or psilocybin - is a growing trend in popular culture. Recent studies on full-dose psychedelic psychotherapy reveal promising benefits for mental well-being, especially for depression and end-of-life anxiety. While full-dose therapies include perception-distorting properties, microdosing may provide complementary clinical benefits using lower-risk, non-hallucinogenic doses. No experimental study has evaluated psychedelic microdosing, however; this pre-registered study is the first to investigate microdosing psychedelics and mental health. Recruited from online forums, current and former microdosers scored lower on measures of dysfunctional attitudes and negative emotionality and higher on wisdom, open-mindedness, and creativity when compared to non-microdosing controls. These findings provide promising initial evidence that warrants controlled experimental research to directly test safety and clinical efficacy. As microdoses are easier to administer than full-doses, this new paradigm has the exciting potential to shape future psychedelic research.

scholarly journals Gastronomy unravelled by physics: Gastrophysics

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 153-180 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mie Thorborg Pedersen ◽  
Per Lyngs Hansen ◽  
Mathias Porsmose Clausen
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Literature ◽  
Full Range ◽  
Laws Of Nature ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Food Science ◽  
Scientific Disciplines ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
Shed Light

Useful attempts to shed light on the nature of gastronomy from a scientific point of view and to unravel the crucial connection between food, eating and well-being are currently underrepresented in the scientific literature. However, several scientific disciplines ranging from the natural to the social sciences offer valuable new perspectives on gastronomy. As one of the key disciplines in natural science, physics offers original and rigorous perspectives on all processes and structures constrained by the laws of nature. The emerging discipline called gastrophysics employs the full range of concepts, techniques and methods from physics to generate useful scientific input to the complex and holistic reflections on gastronomy. Relying on a review of the existing literature, this article illustrates how a science-based gastrophysics emerges, to a large extent from the convoluted history of food science as well as from various recent – and often overlapping – attempts to combine modern scientific methodology to questions from gastronomy. However, the present review also insists on a physics-inspired methodology to handle scale and complexity in food preparation and consumption across length scales from sub-molecular to entire foods. We exemplify how gastrophysics directly helps to develop gastronomy and how it adds to current approaches in traditional food science. We also suggest that gastrophysics may prove relevant in the context of the ongoing food transformation, which focuses strongly on sustainability, but where the importance of gastronomic aspects in this transformation is greatly needed.

What Can Stutterers Learn from the Neurodiversity Movement?

2018 ◽  
Vol 39 (04) ◽  
pp. 382-396 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Constantino
Keyword(s):  
Natural Variation ◽  
Medical Model ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Social Oppression ◽  
Conventional View ◽  
Models Of Disability ◽  
History Of ◽  
Way Of Thinking ◽  
The Individual

AbstractNeurodiversity is both an empowerment movement and a way of thinking about disability. Rather than focusing on pathology and impairment, neurodiversity emphasizes natural variation and the unique skills, experiences, and traits of neurodivergent individuals. People who stutter are beginning to work with and derive value from these concepts. In this article, we look at the history of neurodiversity and its key ideas. We discuss the conventional view of disability, the medical model, which situates disability within the individual as pathology. We also take up social and relation models of disability, which situate disability in social oppression or mismatches between individuals and their environment. Neurodiversity has not been without controversy. We look at some of the disagreements surrounding issues of intervention and cure. The ideas of neurodiversity are applied to stuttering, and a case example illustrating therapy using these ideas is given. We conclude that therapy should focus on subject's well-being and not normalization of superficial behaviors.

De psychologie van arbeid en gezondheid: verleden, heden en toekomst

2004 ◽  
Vol 17 (5) ◽  
Author(s):  
Wilmar Schaufeli
Keyword(s):  
Health Psychology ◽  
Occupational Health ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Social Psychological ◽  
Occupational Health Psychology ◽  
Institutional Climate ◽  
Optimal Functioning ◽  
Future Challenges ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Health And Well Being

Occupational Health Psychology: past, present and future Occupational Health Psychology: past, present and future Wilmar Schaufeli, Gedrag & Organisatie, Volume 17, October 2004, nr. 5, pp. 327-341 Occupational Health Psychology (OHP) concerns studying and improving employees' health and well-being. Although some psychologists pioneered the field a long time ago, OHP emerged relatively recent in the 1990s. The Netherlands have played an important role in its development, since OHP found a fertile soil in the country's legal, political, social, psychological, and institutional climate. In view of both external (i.e. societal) and internal (i.e. scientific) developments the future of OHP research is described. In particular, some important results and future challenges of five different types of research are discussed: explanatory, descriptive, tool development, intervention and organizational change research, respectively. The article concludes with the observation that the current 'negative' approach of OHP that focuses on unhealthiness, unwell-being and malfunctioning is evolving towards a more 'positive' approach that focuses on health, well-being and optimal functioning.

Introduction: The New Paradigm

2019 ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Andrew E. Clark ◽  
Sarah Flèche ◽  
Richard Layard ◽  
Nattavudh Powdthavee ◽  
George Ward
Keyword(s):  
Life Satisfaction ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Relative Importance ◽  
New Paradigm ◽  
Policy Makers

This introductory chapter briefly describes the ways in which happiness and well-being can be laid out in quantitative terms. It argues that this endeavor is crucial both for individuals as well as for policy makers. Here, the chapter focuses on individual well-being over individual lifespan. In adulthood that is measured by life-satisfaction, and in childhood by mood and feelings. Having measured happiness, the chapter turns to the next step: explaining it—to understand why some people flourish, while others languish. It does so by introducing a single framework which shows the relative importance of the different factors involved in one's well-being. Finally, the chapter offers some warnings regarding the findings in this book and provides some concluding thoughts.

Existentialism and Higher Education: A Renewed Intersection in Well-Being

2020 ◽  
pp. 002216782091723
Author(s):  
Glen Lewis Sherman
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Focal Point ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Humanistic Psychology ◽  
Existential Philosophy ◽  
Nichomachean Ethics ◽  
Individual Health ◽  
Key Concepts ◽  
Self Discovery ◽  
Sense Of Justice

Enhanced well-being for students, staff, and faculty has become a focal point on many campuses across North America. Well-being promotion tends to focus on the “wellness” half of well-being, practices related to individual health, stress-management, enhanced coping, and environmental conditions. These efforts, while significant, address the symptoms, not the root causes of what has led to the degree of experienced un-wellness or ill-being. What has not yet been adequately articulated in well-being theory, as applied to the higher education setting, is a focus on the “being” half of the well-being phrase, how higher education is connected to a student’s subjectivity and the meanings they give to the objective world. This article proposes a conception of well-being in higher education that stems from existential philosophy and humanistic psychology, as well as key concepts from Aristotle’s Nichomachean Ethics. Higher education is seen as a place where students’ self-discovery informs their approach to knowledge and learning, as well as their development of an ethical sense of justice and the rights of others in the educational community. Well-being is in this way rendered more fully.

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