‘If therapies from cognitive, biological and psychodynamic approaches work as treatments, why do we need positive psychology?’
An answer to this question, involving detailed analysis of the therapies.
I used this as part of my revision for my first year exams in which I attained 98%. I ac...
‘If therapies from cognitive, biological and psychodynamic approaches work as
treatments, why do we need positive psychology?’
Discuss the above quote [20]
Positive Psychology claims in a sense to be superior to the classic disciplines of
cognitive, biological and psychodynamic psychology in that it focuses on what
makes people happier as opposed to finding out why they are sad. It works from
0 rather than -10 so to speak. However, since the therapies from the afore
mentioned approaches have proven to be hugely effective and have brought
people’s happiness far above the minimum in many instances, the debate is
raised as to how much we actually need Positive Psychology. Is it a crucial,
transformative approach which serves to radically improve the lives of those who
are OK, or a money grabbing, elitist scheme to prey on people who’s lives just
aren’t quite good enough?
21st Century Western Society has been the breeding ground for the ideas of
Seligman, Csikszentmihalyi and the like to take off and find themselves in our
class rooms, work places and doctors offices, and it’s understandable why.
Students who have experienced positive psychology curriculum are half as likely
to show symptoms of depression as those who haven’t (Seligman et al. 2009)
and studies suggest that up to 70% of professionals who use positive techniques
to utilise their strengths feel more engaged and energised in their work. The
clear difference here between Positive Psychology and the old school therapies is
that it can be integrated into every part of life. It fills in the gaps left by people
who aren’t depressed or anxious, serving as a sort of preventative measure for
the very issues people look to therapy to solve.
However, to integrate Positive Psychology into schools and offices, money needs
to be spent and time needs to be made. In a report published by Financial Times
(2007) it was said that adding Positive Psychology to curriculums could lead to
society paying the price for children leaving school with less academic
achievements- because for one thing to be added another needs to be removed.
One could argue that school is not the place for learning how to be happy and
that parents should be instilling these skills in their children from birth using
common sense and that those who slip through the cracks can then be
introduced to talking or drug therapies. The Foresight Mental Capital and
Wellbeing Project (2008) evidenced the costs of unhappiness and stress in the
work place to be up to £26 billion a year for the British Economy, however it
would be naive to say Positive Psychology could solve this when it’s a) not viable
for everyone to find flow in a job and b) it could potentially be another source of
pressure on people to always do well- in this case doing well meaning being
happy.
In terms of inclusivity, Positive Psychology falls short of all of its negative
counterparts. In the UK anybody can refer themselves to Cognitive Behavioural
Therapy on the NHS and psychotherapeutic drugs are available too. Both
treatments work for people from a variety of cultural and socio economic
backgrounds, as they can be tailored and tweaked to the individual. Positive
Psychology on the other hand is hugely biased toward the white middle class,
not only because it is Euro-centric (Christopher and Hickenbottom, 2008) , but
because it assumes life is a level playing field; a common misconception of the
privileged. In Quality of Life Therapy, a person is asked to focus on the areas of
their life which are good rather than those which cause bother, but this would be
ineffective for people’s who’s ‘overall satisfaction’ is low, or when the area of
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