The impact of a wellbeing program imbedded in university classes: the importance of valuing happiness, baseline wellbeing and practice frequency

ABSTRACT

Universities must prepare students for a complex world, but current mental health levels impair student outcomes. Increased concern over student wellbeing has fostered the demand for positive education interventions – a relatively new topic requiring more research. We tested a positive psychology wellbeing intervention imbedded in undergraduate psychology classes with three studies and 469 participants. Intervention outcomes across three years indicate improvements in wellbeing, positive affect, negative affect and clinical wellbeing categories. Comparisons with an active control indicated the intervention buffered against semester stress. Practice frequency had little effect on wellbeing, however wellbeing gains were higher for students with low baseline wellbeing and those who valued happiness more – suggesting positive education interventions have greater value for some students. This research has important implications for student wellbeing, indicating that imbedded wellbeing programs can improve student wellbeing with minimal resources and low stigma.

KEYWORDS:

• University wellbeing
• positive education
• positive psychology
• interventions
• mental health
• higher education

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to acknowledge the many students who participated in this study and shared their thoughts and time. We’d also like to acknowledge and thank the Positive Psychology teachers: Paul Harnett, Sarah Bentley, Zahra Mirnajafi, Kathryn Farr and Leanne Gordon. In addition, our thanks to Michael Norwood for his research suggestions and encouragement.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Study 2 alphas are included as this was the only study when all measures were used.

2 Full details of qualitative methods are available upon request.

3 Further qualitative data and results are available upon request.

4 See supplementary materials for details.