A science of positive subjective experience, positive individual traits, and positive institutions promises to improve quality of life and prevent the pathologies that arise when life is barren and meaningless. The exclusive focus on pathology that has dominated so much of our discipline results in a model of the human being lacking the positive features that make life worth living. Hope, wisdom, creativity, future mindedness, courage, spirituality, responsibility, and perseverance are ignored or explained as transformations of more authentic negative impulses. The 15 articles in this millennial issue of the American Psychologist discuss such issues as what enables happiness, the effects of autonomy and self-regulation, how optimism and hope affect health, what constitutes wisdom, and how talent and creativity come to fruition. The authors outline a framework for a science of positive psychology, point to gaps in our knowledge, and predict that the next century will see a science and profession that will come to understand and build the factors that allow individuals, communities, and societies to flourish. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved)

Seligman, M. E. P., & Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2000). Positive psychology: An introduction. The American Psychologist, 55(1), 5-14.  

Positive psychology has flourished in the last 5 years. The authors review recent developments in the field, including books, meetings, courses, and conferences. They also discuss the newly created classification of character strengths and virtues, a positive complement to the various editions of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (e. g., American Psychiatric Association, 1994), and present some cross-cultural findings that suggest a surprising ubiquity of strengths and virtues. Finally, the authors focus on psychological interventions that increase individual happiness. In a 6-group, random-assignment, placebo-controlled Internet study, the authors tested 5 purported happiness interventions and 1 plausible control exercise. They found that 3 of the interventions lastingly increased happiness and decreased depressive symptoms. Positive interventions can supplement traditional interventions that relieve suffering and may someday be the practical legacy of positive psychology.

Seligman, M. E., Steen, T. A., Park, N., & Peterson, C. (2005). Positive psychology progress: Empirical validation of interventions. The American Psychologist, 60(5), 410-421.  

Previous studies suggest that some autistic individuals report lower satisfaction, or well-being, with different aspects of everyday life than those without autism. It is unclear whether this might be partly explained by symptoms of anxiety and/or depression, which affect at least 20%–50% of autistic people. In this study, we measured individual differences in well-being in 573 six to thirty-year-olds with and without a diagnosis of autism. We investigated whether individual differences in well-being were explained by autism traits (e.g. social-communication difficulties) and/or anxiety and depression symptoms. We showed that, though well-being was lower for some autistic individuals, compared to those without autism, many autistic individuals reported good well-being. Where well-being was reduced, this was particularly explained by depression symptoms, across all ages. For children/adolescents, anxiety and social-communication difficulties were also related to some aspects of well-being. Our study suggests that support and services for improving mental health, especially depression symptoms, may also improve broader outcomes for autistic people.

Oakley, B. F. M., Tillmann, J., Ahmad, J., Crawley, D., San José Cáceres, A., Holt, R., Charman, T., Banaschewski, T., Buitelaar, J., Simonoff, E., Murphy, D., & Loth, E. (2021). How do core autism traits and associated symptoms relate to quality of life? Findings from the longitudinal european autism project. Autism: The International Journal of Research and Practice, 25(2), 389–404.  

Transdisciplinary approaches (TDA) have provided a useful way to assess, formulate and monitor personalized individual strategies which share a common starting point where expertise from different disciplines come together in better and more efficiently understanding the individual’s special needs and their autism. This paper aims to present through a single-case study how shared formulation informing interventions and strategies have been applied by adopting a transdisciplinary embedded approach through the adoption of a model of well-being – PERMA model. Differences between multi-disciplinary and transdisciplinary approaches are briefly discussed. Identification of barriers to accessing learning, evidence-based challenging behaviour profiles, identification of sensory and functional communication needs, a shared understanding of the individual and a consistent resilient team approach are presented and discussed. Qualitative and quantitative outcomes are ultimately presented and discussed with further reflections on the impact for the wider education practice and provision.

Roncaglia, I. (2018). Transdisciplinary approaches embedded through PERMA with autistic individual: A case study. Psychological Thought, 11(2), 224-233.  

Seligman recently introduced the PERMA model with five core elements of psychological well-being: positive emotions, engagement, relationships, meaning, and accomplishment. We empirically tested this multidimensional theory with 516 Australian male students (age 13–18). From an extensive well-being assessment, we selected a subset of items theoretically relevant to PERMA. Factor analyses recovered four of the five PERMA elements, and two ill-being factors (depression and anxiety). We then explored the nomological net surrounding each factor by examining cross-sectional associations with life satisfaction, hope, gratitude, school engagement, growth mindset, spirituality, physical vitality, physical activity, somatic symptoms, and stressful life events. Factors differentially related to these correlates, offering support for the multidimensional approach to measuring well-being. Directly assessing subjective well-being across multiple domains offers the potential for schools to more systematically understand and promote well-being.

Kern, M. L., Waters, L. E., Adler, A., & White, M. A. (2014). A multidimensional approach to measuring well-being in students: Application of the PERMA framework. The Journal of Positive Psychology, 10(3), 262–271. doi.org/10.1080/17439760.2014.936962  

Flourish: A new understanding of Life's Greatest Goals- and what it takes to reach them. In this groundbreaking book, one of the world's foremost academic psychologists- and founder of the Positive Psychology movement- offers a new theory on what makes people flourish and how to truly get the most out of life. Eight years have passed since the publication of Dr Seligman's internationally bestselling Authentic Happiness. As a highly esteemed psychologist, Dr Seligman has been on the cutting edge of psychological research for over two decades, pioneering a science that improves people's lives. And now, with his most life-changing book yet, Flourish, he offers a new theory of individual satisfaction and global purpose. In a fascinating evolution of thought, Flourish, refines what Positive Psychology is all about and offers inspiring stories of Positive Psychology in action- innovative schools that add resilience to their curricula, with a case study of Geelong Grammar in particular: a new theory of success and intelligence; and evidence on how positive physical health can turn medicine on its head. Building on his game-changing work on optimism, motivation, and character, Dr Seligman shows us how to flourish and bring well being into our own lives.

Seligman, M. E. P. (2013). Flourish. Simon & Schuster. 

Virtually all human individual differences have been shown to be moderately heritable. Much of this research, however, focuses on measures of dysfunctional behavior and relatively fewer studies have focused on positive traits. The values in action (VIA) project is a comprehensive and ambitious classification of 24 positive traits, also known as character strengths (Peterson, C., & Seligman, M. E. P. (2004). Character strengths and virtues: A handbook and classification. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association), the majority of which have received no behavior genetic attention. Using a sample of 336 middle-aged twins drawn from the Minnesota Twin Registry who completed the VIA inventory of strengths, we detected significant genetic and non-shared environmental effects for 21 of 24 character strengths with little evidence of shared environmental contributions. Associations with a previously administered measure of normal personality found moderate phenotypic overlap and that genetic influences on personality traits could account for most, but not all, of the heritable variance in character strengths. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved)

Steger, M. F., Hicks, B. M., Kashdan, T. B., Krueger, R. F., & Bouchard, T. J. (2007). Genetic and environmental influences on the positive traits of the values in action classification, and biometric covariance with normal personality. Journal of Research in Personality, 41(3), 524–539.  

Four studies examined the intrapersonal and interpersonal consequences of seeking out others when good things happen (i.e., capitalization). Two studies showed that communicating personal positive events with others was associated with increased daily positive affect and well-being, above and beyond the impact of the positive event itself and other daily events. Moreover, when others were perceived to respond actively and constructively (and not passively or destructively) to capitalization attempts, the benefits were further enhanced. Two studies found that close relationships in which one’s partner typically responds to capitalization attempts enthusiastically were associated with higher relationship well-being (e.g., intimacy, daily marital satisfaction). The results are discussed in terms of the theoretical and empirical importance of understanding how people “cope” with positive events, cultivate positive emotions, and enhance social bonds.

Gable, S. L., Reis, H. T., Impett, E. A., & Asher, E. R. (2004). What do you do when things go right? The Intrapersonal and Interpersonal benefits of sharing positive events. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 87(2), 228–245.  

In the last 10 years sport psychology expanded its applicability in a variety of fields which have helped to address some of the challenges related to high level performance and sport competition. When we talk about performance in its wider sense, sport psychology is able to help develop a better understanding on how strategies can be adopted in improving general human performance levels. This includes increasing the knowledge of key concepts such as motivation, self-confidence and resilience. Furthermore performance in its wider sense helps in the understanding of the impact of stress and arousal and how these can affect both positively and negatively performance levels including appreciating individual differences as well as dynamics between groups of individuals. In this paper performance rather than solely be related to the field of competitive or professional sport has been discussed in people with ASCs and aims to explore how by adopting a positive psychological model in the formulation of individual assessments and subsequent interventions have led to improvement in individual skills, participation, engagement and ultimately quality of life. Positive psychological principles, such as the role of wellbeing and wellness, the PERMA Model has increased our understanding of human potentials, performance and wellbeing. The aim of this paper is to present and reflect on the applicability and benefits of adopting sport psychology models, the PERMA model and positive psychological principles in special education and care settings with the presentation and discussion of their theoretical and some practical implementation in two case studies.

Roncaglia, I. (2017). The role of wellbeing and wellness: A positive psychological model in supporting young people with ascs. Psychological Thought. 10(1). 217-226. 10.5964/psyct.v10i1.203.