The Wiley Blackwell handbook of positive psychological interventions

Abstract

When positive psychology was founded in the late 1990s, little work existed on interventions that aimed to increase happiness. Fordyce’s (1977, 1983) work was seminal in this domain but only a few studies dotted the literature in the follow- ing two decades. At the turn of the twenty-first century, however, prompted by the interest generated by Seligman’s American Psychological Association presi- dential address and spurred on by several initiatives within the field to launch new research, this work began to flourish. Duckworth, Steen, and Seligman (2005) posited that at least 100 positive psychological interventions had been suggested and by the time Sin and Lyubomirsky (2009) conducted a meta-analysis of posi- tive psychological interventions, they were able to identify empirical studies of 51 interventions (with only seven papers published prior to 2000). Despite this grow- ing body of research, no canonical resource for those interested in the current state of affairs of positive psychological interventions existed. In a 2005 update for the field, Seligman, Steen, Park, and Peterson offered a set of interventions (i.e., the Gratitude Visit, Three Good Things, You at Your Best, Using Signature Strengths in a New Way, and Identifying Signature Strengths) that was widely influential, yet was far from a definitive list of interventions and lacked a thorough description of their theoretical rationale.