Taylor Davies and Dr. Jeffrey Reber, Psychology Department
Introduction
With the emergence of positive psychology at the turn of the century a greater focus has been centered on understanding and improving individual well-being. Various techniques, including gratitude journaling, have been shown to reframe individual perspective and promote well-being. Theories and studies have shown that relationships are a key component of happiness, but techniques to aid participants in reframing towards a relational perspective have been absent to date. This study tests the technique of relational journaling and its effect on participant well-being against daily event and gratitude journaling.
The science of positive psychology took off at the turn of the century when then APA President Martin Seligman and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi introduced the branch of psychology as a necessary component in shifting psychology from a disease model (i.e. a symptom alleviation focus) towards a holistic understanding of individuals (Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi, 2000). Historically positive psychology has focused on understanding human well-being in terms of positive emotions, traits and institutions. Recently, application based techniques have begun to emerge as a way for incorporating the principles of positive psychological research. The most prominent of these is the gratitude journal. Gratitude journaling is a happiness intervention that helps participants decreased depressive symptoms by reframing their perspective in the form of writing three items or events each day that they were grateful with a corresponding reason (Seligman, Steen, Park & Peterson, 2005). Other findings have affirmed that a gratitude outlook improves well-being in comparison to control groups (Emmons & McCullough, 2003).
Another emerging theme in positive psychology is the importance of relationships and relationality. Positive psychologists continue to emphasize the importance of creating and nurturing relationships as a key component life satisfaction (Froh et al., 2007). However, the application of potential techniques for relationality is sparse and has to date been focused on using writing as a tool for working through relationship termination (Lewandowski, 2009) rather than the building and strengthening of current relationships. This study seeks to fill that void by incorporating the principles of relationality with the current foundation of positive psychological research in attempt to create a new therapeutic technique to help participants improve well-being by focusing on the nurturing and savoring of meaningful relationships.
Methodology
Upon recruitment participants completed a short demographic survey that also includes the three self-report measures of well-being. Each participant was asked to write in a hard copy journal five times a week for five to ten minutes over a two week period according to provided “relational” focused prompts. At the end of the two week journaling exercise week all participants will take another survey to measure indicators of well-being.
Results
The initial pilot study produced some interesting results of note. 11 total college-aged students participated nine showed a positive increase in measures of well-being. Improvements ranged 2% to 40% increase on well-being measures. Of those students who showed decreased measures of well-being their change in scores were 8% and 9% respectively. Of the three subscales the greatest difference resulted from the Satisfaction with Life subscale where ten of 11 participants showed positive improvements. The General happiness subscale showed the most consistent results with seven of 11 participants having positive improvements and the remaining four showing no change in their scores. The gratitude subscale showed the most variance with seven of 11 participants showing improvement and four of 11 showing a decrease in measures of well-being.
Discussion
The results of this initial pilot study tend to indicate an overall trend of improvement amongst participants using the tool. Future studies that compare the use of relational journaling to other journaling styles (i.e. gratitude journaling, life-event journaling) will provide additional insight into the psychological benefits associated with varying journaling techniques. Also, further research should incorporate additional data collection and qualitative analysis of the journals to examine themes across participants that might provide additional insight as to the reasons for observed improvements.
Conclusion
The initial pilot study of positive relational journaling shows that promising and alternative tools can be developed to better improve the well-being of individuals. These techniques and tools have shown initial promise that validates the continued study of their use and implementations into a variety of applications and settings. As the research of this topic progresses into future studies and applications and increased understanding of the relationship between different journaling techniques and well-being, additional contributions to the field of positive psychology are expected to arise.