Happy thoughts: Enhancing well-being in the classroom with a positive events diary

Positive psychology interventions (PPIs) are effective in increasing well-being across the population. Whilst educators are recognising the importance of well-being in the classroom and of its long-term impact on life trajectory, the transformative potential of PPIs in educational settings is yet to be fully realised. This study investigates, for the first time, the effects of a PPI in school children by means of a daily dairy. Self-report questionnaires were used to measure well-being in school children aged 8–11 years. Across two studies, children kept a positive events diary, recording three experiences every day for a week. The intervention led to an increase in happiness and a decrease in depressive symptoms immediately following the intervention and at a three-month follow-up. Children who had unhappier baseline scores benefitted more from the intervention. This study demonstrates significant scope, in school settings, for targeted light-touch interventions to promote well-being in those with the greatest need.     

Interpreting inclusion: A contribution to the study of the child's cognitive and linguistic development

Six experiments are reported which examine the young child's ability to compare included and nonincluded sets. Results indicate that with certain forms of task presentation most 3- to 5-year-old children can compare part with whole. Further, errors which occur in inclusion tasks are similar to errors which occur in tasks involving comparison of nonincluded sets. Thus young children can solve inclusion problems, and their customary failure to do so does not arise because the problem requires comparison of a whole with an included part. Employing a distinction between intended tasks (those which the adult wishes the child to complete) and received tasks (those which the child, in fact, completes) the studies indicate how linguistic and perceptual aspects of the presented information may interact with the child's assumptions about the nature of the task to be completed.     

Religiosity and Quality of Life in Older Christian Women in Ireland: A Mixed Methods Analysis

Journal of Religion and Health - This study used a mixed methods approach to understand the ways in which religion and quality of life (QoL) are associated in later life in Ireland. Longitudinal...     

Conservation accidents

Eighty children aged between 4 years 2 months and 6 years 3 months were tested on length and number conservation, both when the transformation occured because of a direct action by the experimenter and when it happened ‘accidentally’ as the by-product of an activity directed towards a different goal. Fifty children conserved when the transformation was ‘accidental’, whereas only 13 were successful when it was intentional. These results are interpreted as evidence that characteristics of the experimenter's behaviour, in particular his actions towards the task materials, can influence children's interpretation of utterances by suggesting the experimenter is thinking about a different attribute from that specified linguistically. It is suggested that traditional procedures may underestimate children's cognitive abilities.