Be Your Best You: A Pilot Study of a Positive Psychology Programme for People with Depression, Anxiety or Stress in Greece

Abstract

This pilot study aimed to design a Positive Psychology programme for depression, anxiety or stress and test its effectiveness among Greek Psychology students. Twenty-six participants with severe or very severe symptoms of depression, anxiety or stress were assigned to the intervention and control groups. Participants in the intervention group attended six weekly sessions of the Be Your Best You Programme. All participants completed self-report questionnaires (Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale, Positive and Negative Affect Scale, Satisfaction with Life Scale) when the programme started and on the completion of the six-week intervention programme. The results indicated significant decreases in depression, anxiety, stress, and negative emotions, as well as increases in satisfaction with life among the people who attended the programme. Our findings suggest that a programme consisted of evidence-based Positive Psychology interventions could be offered to people suffering from depression, anxiety or stress to managing their difficulties. Further studies are required in this field to establish Positive Psychology intervention as a treatment of choice.

INTRODUCTION - Latest developments in Positive Psychology: The case of Greece

“…gratitude, kindness, and forgiveness (Symeonidou et al, 2019;Zichnali et al, 2019), or a pool of component-specific exercises, e.g. wellbeing interventions (Athanasakou et al, 2020;Kotsoni et al, 2020;Leontopoulou, 2015).…”