Browsing by Subject "hyvinvointiteoria"

Goals. The intention of my research was to analyze and increase understanding of the well-being theory by PhD Martin Seligman. Seligman is one of the leading characters and contributors of positive psychology and his theories and insights are widely cited among the researches and articles discussing positive psychology. Positive psychology has raised a lot of attention as a novel field of research and it is reasonable to take an analytical review at the theoretical elements it is built on. Hence the aim of this research is to further analyze the content and foundation of Martin Seligman's theory. Methods. My research was theoretical-conceptual in nature and the chosen research method was systematic analysis. Systematic analysis enables theoretical investigation and interpretation of the literary material. The aim is to get a deeper understanding of the research object through clarification and reconstructuring of the logical entity of the theory. The object of research and primary research material of this study was Martin Seligman's publication Flourish, A Visionary new understanding of happiness and well-being (2011). The analysis focuses on clarifying Seligman's well-being theory. The most essential concepts, their relations and theoretical coherence are examined in the study together with Seligman's argumentation. Results and conclusions. As the result of my research I will represent a reconstruction of the well-being theory based on the conducted analysis. The reconstruction describes the essential concepts of the theory together with their relations. The results of the research also indicate, that even though Seligman's theory contains a new and interesting conceptual point of view for observing positive psychology and well-being, it also contains some incoherence and even faults. These shortages weaken the credibility and reliability of the theory. Firstly, the theory's essential concept "flourishing" has not been defined explicitly. Secondly, Seligman indicates two separate roles for flourishing, which seems incoherent. Thirdly, Seligman describes his theory as descriptive although it seems to be normative. Consequently, it seems uncertain whether Seligman is aiming at a neutral description of decisions leading to well-being or giving recommendations of what people should choose for being well. The fourth problem is how Seligman argues the comprehensiveness of the well-being theory by comparing it to his preceding Authentic happiness -theory (2004). This comparison of the two theories seems however bias. The fifth problem in the theory is how Seligman describes whether the engagement-element can be evaluated only subjectively or both subjectively and objectively. As a conclusion, it may be stated that Seligman's theory should be further critically analyzed and developed to enable its utilization as the foundation for positive psychology.