None listed
Conditions
Brief summary
For many years, research into children’s social and emotional development has focused on ways to treat problematic and risk behaviours, whereas there studies focusing on strategies to promote positive development fell short. This is unfortunate, as children who fare well report less deviance and conduct problems and have better self-concept, integration into school, and closeness to others, when compared with children reporting only moderate psychological welfare. From a positive psychological perspective, this study therefore aimed to examine how we can encourage children to thrive and flourish. One type of behaviour related to flourishing is prosocial behaviour, which comprises all acts that benefit another person. In 2012, Layous and colleagues found that prompting children to act prosocial by means of a kindness intervention has positive effects on two indicators of welfare among Canadian children, namely wellbeing (i.e., positive affect, happiness, and life satisfaction) and peer acceptance. The goal of the present study was to examine the effectiveness of the kindness intervention in sample of Dutch children. It was expected that children who were exposed to the four-week kindness intervention would increase in wellbeing and peer acceptance over time, whereas children in the control condition would not.
Interventions
This study examined the effectiveness of a four-week kindness intervention (based on the intervention of Layous and colleagues, 2012). After completing the baseline questionnaire (which happened in class during school hours), the primary investigator instructed children in the experimental condition to perform a minimum of three kind acts every Wednesday during the four-week intervention. Children were free to choose what kind acts they carried out and for whom (e.g., getting coffee for a teache
This study examined the effectiveness of a four-week kindness intervention (based on the intervention of Layous and colleagues, 2012). After completing the baseline questionnaire (which happened in class during school hours), the primary investigator instructed children in the experimental condition to perform a minimum of three kind acts every Wednesday during the four-week intervention. Children were free to choose what kind acts they carried out and for whom (e.g., getting coffee for a teacher, lending a pencil to a classmate, or comforting a little brother). All children received a form (based on that of Layous and colleagues, 2012) including a description of what kind acts are, examples of kind acts, and the instruction to perform a minimum of three kind acts on Wednesday, which was read out loud by the primary investigator. Teachers were asked to help remind children about this by handing out the same instruction forms on Tuesday. Moreover, all children received a diary to keep track of the kind acts they performed. The diaries included detailed instructions on how to correctly report the kind acts. Every Thursday during the intervention, children were given the opportunity to fill in their diary during school hours. More specifically, they were asked to report the date, the type of kind act they performed, and the recipient of the kind act. The diaries were collected directly after the post-intervention questionnaire (i.e., 4 weeks after baseline).
Sponsors
Radboud University
Study design
Allocation
Randomised controlled trial
Intervention model
Parallel
Primary purpose
Educational / counselling / training
Masking
Blinded (masking used) (Subject)
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
All
Age
9 Years to 13 Years
Healthy volunteers
Yes
Inclusion criteria
Girls and boys from grades 7 and 8 of Dutch primary schools (9-13 years) Children whose parents provided passive consent for their child to participate Children that were willing and able to provide written consent
Exclusion criteria
Schools that participated in a prosocial program during the past two years Schools that participated in an anti-bullying program during the past two years
Outcome results
None listed