Research reveals that positive psychology interventions can alleviate depression!

Posted by: drronahart on: November 2, 2010

• In: depression | positive psychology
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Dear friends
Here is something to be happy about: researchers have found that positive psychology interventions can alleviate depression!
You may not be familiar with positive psychology and therefore asking yourself – OK what’s the big deal here?
The big deal is that positive psychology interventions are short termed – sometimes very short (just one meeting!), and do not require the client to be in any kind of long-term therapy. Some interventions can be applied just by reading about them in a book, audio, video, etc… And as the rigorous research quoted here shows – it works!!
Hurray for positive psychology, and good news for our well being!
Take care!
rona

Positive psychology interventions to enhance well-being – Meta-Analylis

Enhancing well-being and alleviating depressive symptoms with positive psychology interventions: a practice-friendly meta-analysis, Journal of Clinical Psychology, 2009, Volume 65 Issue 5, Pages 467 – 487

Abstract:

Do positive psychology interventions – that is, treatment methods or intentional activities aimed at cultivating positive feelings, positive behaviors, or positive cognitions – enhance well-being and ameliorate depressive symptoms? A meta-analysis of 51 such interventions with 4,266 individuals was conducted to address this question and to provide practical guidance to clinicians. The results revealed that positive psychology interventions do indeed significantly enhance well-being (mean r=.29) and decrease depressive symptoms (mean r=.31). In addition, several factors were found to impact the effectiveness of positive psychology interventions, including the depression status, self-selection, and age of participants, as well as the format and duration of the interventions. Accordingly, clinicians should be encouraged to incorporate positive psychology techniques into their clinical work, particularly for treating clients who are depressed, relatively older, or highly motivated to improve. Our findings also suggest that clinicians would do well to deliver positive psychology interventions as individual (versus group) therapy and for relatively longer periods of time.

and here is the link to the full research report
http://www.faculty.ucr.edu/~sonja/papers/SL2009.pdf

Tags: depression, positive psychology interventions