The Three Pillars of Positive Psychology

Peterson (2006, p. 7) asks, “Is positive psychology just happiology?” Is the field’s focus on making people happier? Well, in part, yes. Happiness is studied under the umbrella term positive psychology, but to say that it is the focus of positive psychology would be misleading. The research in this subarea is much more diverse than you may have initially realized.

The field of positive psychology can be divided into three areas of study: 

• positive experiences (happiness, pleasure, gratification, and fulfillment),
• positive traits (strengths of character, talents, interests, and values), and
• positive social institutions (families, schools, businesses, communities, and societies).

As you can see, the field focuses on quite a bit more than happiness. Yes, happiness is one of the core areas studied within the field, but it is only a small slice of the pie. The course will begin with an exploration of the concept of happiness, but the remaining topics covered are quite diverse.