Posts tagged with 'positive emotions'
Recent research: six articles on wellbeing – meaning in life, reappraisal, positive emotions, and neighbourliness
23rd July 2009
Here are six research articles (see below for abstracts and links) loosely falling into the overall area of wellbeing. Boyle, Barnes et al report on the association between purpose in life and mortality in older people. They found that greater purpose in life was associated with considerably reduced mortality even …
Autogenic training: an introduction
20th July 2009
Autogenic Training (AT) is a method of producing deeply relaxed, peaceful states of mind and body. AT can accurately be viewed as both a form of relaxation and a form of meditation - the "Four aspects of inner focus" chart illustrates mechanisms of action. Autogenics is often taught as a …
“Smile intensity in photographs predicts divorce later in life”
5th July 2009
I do think that Matt Hertenstein and colleagues came up with an eye catching title here: Hertenstein, M., C. Hansel, et al. (2009). "Smile intensity in photographs predicts divorce later in life." Motivation and Emotion 33(2): 99-105. [Abstract/Full Text] [Free Full Text] Abstract: Based on social-functional accounts of emotion, we …
Three good books: “Positivity”, “The Compassionate Mind” & “The Spirit Level”
3rd May 2009
Here are three good, recently published books that are all highly relevant to the fields of stress, health & wellbeing. "Positivity" by Barbara Fredrickson (see below) is subtitled, a little breathlessly - "Groundbreaking research reveals how to embrace the hidden strength of positive emotions, overcome negativity, and thrive." Actually Professor …
Recent research: five papers on feeling good & improved functioning, on meaning & wellbeing, and on happy memories,
12th February 2009
I seem to be making a habit this month of focusing on a specific journal when posting the weekly report on interesting recent research. Last week it was the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology . This week it's the Journal of Positive Psychology . To quote the Journal's website: …
Handouts & questionnaires for emotions, schema & personality
26th January 2009
Here are a set of diverse handouts and questionnaires on emotions, schema and personality. The "triangle of emotions" is a model I put together to help guide work on the longer term dysfunctional personality patterns that we probably all experience to some extent. The "big five" is a very widely …
Handouts & questionnaires for emotions & feelings
19th January 2009
Here are a set of handouts and questionnaires about emotions. It seems helpful to understand emotions through an evolutionary perspective - we have emotions, to a large extent, because they had (and have) survival value. We are the descendants of people with adaptive emotional systems that helped them stay alive …
New Year’s resolution – would you like to be happier?
28th December 2008
So here's a blast from the past ... that could be fun and useful for a New Year's resolution. I first came across Michael Fordyce's research year's ago (Fordyce 1977; Fordyce 1983). It was probably the first serious scientific exploration of how to help people become happier that I'd ever …
Barbara Fredrickson’s recent research study on loving-kindness meditation (third post)
21st December 2008
What are some implications for using forms of mind training for ourselves and for teaching others? Reading this research study leads me to think about optimum amount of time spent practising these methods, the importance of encouraging application during daily life. I discuss these issues in this blog posting. It …
Barbara Fredrickson’s recent research study on loving-kindness meditation (second post)
14th December 2008
I have already written an initial blog post about Barbara Fredrickson and colleagues' interesting recent research paper (Fredrickson, Cohn et al. 2008) on the effects of teaching people loving-kindness meditation. So what are some possible implications of this research for people in general, for using forms of mind training (meditation, …