Seligman's flourishing: An appraisal of what lies beyond happiness

Page 1 of 3 Book Review Seligman’s flourishing: An appraisal of what lies beyond happiness Book Title: Flourish: A visionary new understanding of happiness and well-being Book Cover: Author: Martin E.P. Seligman ISBN: 978-1-4391-9075-3 Publisher: Free Press, New York, 2011, 349 pp., US$26.00* *Book price at time of review Review Title: Seligman’s flourishing: An appraisal of what lies beyond happiness Reviewer: Llewellyn E. Van Zyl1 Affiliation: 1 Department of Industrial and Organisational Psychology, University of South Africa, Pretoria, South Africa Email: Postal address: PO Box 392, University of South Africa 0003, South Africa How to cite this book review: Van Zyl, L.E. (2013). Seligman’s flourishing: An appraisal of what lies beyond happiness. SA Journal of Industrial Psychology/SA Tydskrif vir Bedryfsielkunde, 39(2), Art. #1168, 3 pages. http://dx.doi.org/10.4102/ sajip.v39i2.1168 Read online: Scan this QR code with your smart phone or mobile device to read online. Introduction Professor Martin Seligman is considered to be the most influential psychologist, researcher and author of modern times (Lyubomirsky, 2011; Van Zyl & Du Toit, 2013). Many psychologists have labelled him as the ‘father’ of positive psychology (Lyubomirsky, 2011) based on his inaugural lecture as president of the American Psychological Association in 1998, in which he called for a more ‘positive approach’ towards understanding the domain of psychology (Wong, 2011b). According to Wong (2011a), Seligman’s inaugural lecture focused on a call for understanding and investigating that which is ‘good’ or ‘excellent’ in human nature, or ‘what makes happy people, happy’. This gave rise to Seligman’s (2002) book Authentic happiness: Using the new positive psychology to realize your potential for lasting fulfilment, in which he argues that happiness is the result of living a ‘pleasant’, ‘good’ and ‘meaningful life’. This book (Seligman 2002) popularised the concept of human happiness in both the academic and self-help spheres. Since its publication in 2002, more than 7600 academic articles have been written on Seligman’s conceptualisation of the topic. However, this approach received much critique from both practitioners and researchers (Sheldon, Kashdan & Steger, 2011; Van Zyl & Rothmann, 2012). Researchers argued that lasting happiness cannot be obtained merely through focusing on the philosophical paradigms and that more attention needs to be given to moderating factors influencing the experience (Wong, 2011a). Practitioners indicated that the effects of interventions structured around the approach are not sustainable (Van Zyl & Du Toit, 2013). Seligman’s response was a new book aimed at addressing the scientific concerns emanating from the critique and moving ‘beyond happiness to understanding human flourishing’. This new book, aptly titled Flourish: A visionary new understanding of happiness and well-being, was an attempt to comment on the critique of researchers and to build out his previous theory on the concept of happiness. The purpose of this review is to provide a brief report and evaluation of the scientific merits of Flourish. General overview The book follows a ten chapter structure similar to many mass market psychology texts. It starts with a general report on Seligman’s new approach towards well-being, highlighting the historical developments in the field of positive psychology and concluding with his contribution to these progressions. Seligman (p. 26) argues that the goal of the book is to highlight the intended focus of positive psychology as a paradigm: ‘to determine the contributors which enhances flourishing’. The first chapter provides an introduction to Seligman’s PERMA theory on human flourishing. This new theory builds upon the original conceptualisation of authentic happiness (comprised of pleasure, meaning and engagement) with two new additions: (1) positive relationships and (2) accomplishments. A brief attempt to conceptualise each component is presented in the first 30 pages of Flourish. This chapter briefly highlights the proposed components of the model and attempts to draw theoretical links between the variables and the concept of flourishing. In summation of this chapter, Seligman argues that the top end of human happiness or ‘flourishing’ is the result of the interaction and experience of PERMA: Positive emotion Engagement in life and work Positive Relationships Meaning in life and work Accomplishments The second and third chapters provide the reader with various approaches and applications of positive psychological interventions (PPIs) to enhance PERMA. These PPIs are regurgitations of a similar chapter in Peterson and Seligman (2004) as well as Seligman (2002) with no significant Copyright: © 2013. The Authors. Licensee: OpenJournals Publishing. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution License. http://http://sajip.co.za doi:10.4102/sajip.v39i2.1168 Page 2 of 3 new contributions. As with the majority of Seligman’s work on PPIs, chapter 2 starts off with the Gratitude Visit, a selfadministered intentional activity aimed at displaying gratitude to an individual who has significantly positively impacted on one’s life. Here, Seligman highlights the benefits of enhancing the experience of positive emotion in the past through the use of gratitude. The gratitude visit has become one of the focal interventions in PPI research as it has been shown to have a profound effect on the sustainability of the experience of positive emotion (Lyubomirsky, 2011; Sin & Lyubomirsky, 2009; Van Zyl & Rothmann, 2012). Further, Seligman briefly touches on other self-administered intentional activities structured around the utilisation and optimisation of signature strengths which have shown to have impacted on the development of sustainable happiness. These sections are paraphrased versions of chapters in Peterson and Seligman (2004). Chapter 3 distinguishes between the effects of PPIs and the use of medication to enhance positive affect. The chapter summarises the work of Lyubomirsky (2007) on the hedonic treadmill and highlights various experiments on the relationship between pain tolerance and happiness. Seligman indicates that individuals with high levels of happiness are able to endure more physical pain, than their unhappy counterparts. Here, he also discusses the benefits of the experience of negative emotions and how medication manufacturers have structured a whole industry around the suffering of the masses. The first three chapters of the book provide a good indication of the value of positive psychology and provide some evidence for PERMA. These chapters provide the layman with a satisfactory overview on the core components of flourishing and provide enough information to entice the reader to research the topic in more depth. However, the following seven chapters are structured around major contributions to the development of positive psychology (...truncated)