Wellbeing, a key aspect of mental health, is moderately heritable with varying estimates reported from independent studies employing a variety of instruments. Recent genome‐wide association studies (GWAS) have enabled the construction of polygenic scores (PGS) for wellbeing, providing the opportunity for direct comparisons of the variance explained by PGS for different instruments commonly employed in the field. Nine wellbeing measurements (multi‐item and single‐item), two personality domains (NEO‐FFI neuroticism and extraversion), plus the depression domain of the DASS‐42 were drawn from a larger self‐report battery applied to the TWIN‐E study—an Australian longitudinal twin cohort (N = 1660). Heritability was estimated using univariate twin modeling and 12‐month test–retest reliability was estimated using intra‐class correlation. PGS were constructed using wellbeing GWAS summary‐statistics from Baselmans et al. (Nat Genet. 2019), and the variance explained estimated using linear models. Last, a GWAS was performed using COMPAS‐W, a quantitative composite wellbeing measure, to explore its utility in genomic studies. Heritability estimates ranged from 23% to 47% across instruments, and multi‐item measures showed higher heritability and test–retest reliability than single‐item measures. The variance explained by PGS was ~0.5% to 1.5%, with considerable variation between measures, and within each measure over 12 months. Five loci with suggestive association (p < 1 × 10−5) were identified from this initial COMPAS‐W wellbeing GWAS. This work highlights the variability across measures currently employed in wellbeing research, with multi‐item and composite measures favored over single‐item measures. While wellbeing PGS are useful in a research setting, they explain little of the phenotypic variance, highlighting gaps for improved gene discovery.

Improving mental wellbeing has a range of benefits for society, including increased productivity, longevity, and resiliency. However, interventions designed to improve mental wellbeing are often only compared to waitlist controls, leaving uncertainty regarding the mechanisms of their effectiveness. The current study in 326 participants assessed a six-week positive psychology intervention against an active control ( n = 163) in an online randomized control trial. Outcome measures included life satisfaction, wellbeing (subjective and psychological wellbeing), stress, depression and anxiety symptoms, and self-compassion. The potential moderating effect of participating during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic was also explored. The intervention group showed greater improvements in life satisfaction by week six (β = 0.18, p = .014) and were maintained through to 7 weeks post-baseline (β = 0.23, t = 3.07, p = .002) and remained significant when accounting for COVID-19 restrictions. An improvement in composite wellbeing from baseline to 7 weeks post-baseline was detected when accounting for COVID-19 restrictions. Composite wellbeing and total depression and anxiety symptoms improved significantly more in the intervention group for participants with low baseline resiliency resources. These findings support the efficacy of using online multi-component positive psychology interventions in boosting wellbeing and reducing distress symptoms particularly in individuals with fewer resiliency resources who may need added support. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10902-021-00449-3.

Sensory suppression refers to the phenomenon that sensory input generated by our own actions, such as moving a finger to press a button to hear a tone, elicits smaller neural responses than sensory input generated by external agents. This observation is usually explained via the internal forward model in which an efference copy of the motor command is used to compute a corollary discharge, which acts to suppress sensory input. However, because moving a finger to press a button is accompanied by neural processes involved in preparing and performing the action, it is unclear whether sensory suppression is the result of movement planning, movement execution, or both. To investigate this, in two experiments, we compared event-related potentials to self-generated tones that were produced by voluntary, semivoluntary, or involuntary button-presses, with externally generated tones that were produced by a computer. In Experiment 1, the semivoluntary and involuntary button-presses were initiated by the participant or experimenter, respectively, by electrically stimulating the median nerve in the participant's forearm, and in Experiment 2, by applying manual force to the participant's finger. We found that tones produced by voluntary button-presses elicited a smaller N1 component of the event-related potential than externally generated tones. This is known as N1-suppression. However, tones produced by semivoluntary and involuntary button-presses did not yield significant N1-suppression. We also found that the magnitude of N1-suppression linearly decreased across the voluntary, semivoluntary, and involuntary conditions. These results suggest that movement planning is a necessary condition for producing sensory suppression. We conclude that the most parsimonious account of sensory suppression is the internal forward model.