Front. 7, 5269. Means and standard deviations of relevance for all character strengths and means across all life domains. Is this one of your top strengths? Get curious to de-escalate issues, clear up misunderstandings, and deepen relationships. Regarding education, we found support for Hypotheses 5.1 and 5.2 (i.e., for the relevance of love of learning and perseverance); however, perseverance was not displayed more frequently in education than in other life domains. J. Happiness Stud. 44, 95109. J. Res. CharacterStrengths.co.uk is a project of enthusiastic educational psychologist, Craig Thomson. These results suggest that close personal relationships increase the positive consequences of strengths-related behavior. Ball State University 2000 W. University Ave. Muncie, IN 47306 800-382-8540 and 765-289-1241, https://www.viacharacter.org/character-strengths/curiosity.

Give a presentation or seminar on a topic that interests you, or simply explain it in detail to friends who are unfamiliar with it. doi: 10.1007/s11205-009-9493-y, Dubreuil, P., Forest, J., and Courcy, F. (2014). Problem Solvers high on Deprivation Sensitivity, medium on other dimensions, 3. These character strengths were selected based on a broad review of positively valued traits in research, history, and popular culture across different cultures (Peterson and Seligman, 2004) and had to fulfill most of the 12 criteria to be included (see Ruch and Stahlmann, 2019). However, contrary to expectations, no relationships were found for curiosity, self-regulation, and humor. Lets look it up together! However you enjoy exploring your personal interestsbooks, podcasts, documentariesshare what you like: I listened to the most amazing story today. J. VIA character strengths among U.S. college students and their associations with happiness, well-being, resiliency, academic success and psychopathology. On average, the sample was highly educated: 57.6% held a higher-education entrance qualification, 26.1% held a university degree, 13.3% had completed vocational training, 1.5% had completed secondary school, and 1.5% were still in secondary school. hAdg%V;^'%Z"id> d_y_="jC>>8(TfY1kaL[" In fact, multiple studies have shown that curious people are a positive asset in societyparticularly the workplace.

The Values in Action (VIA) classification (Peterson and Seligman, 2004) describes character strengths as a family of positively valued traits, a set of qualities that enable individuals (and their communities) to thrive, that is, to achieve optimal psychological functioning or flourishing. I attended a gong bath last week. J. Psychol. Delve into the curious part of your consciousnessand start using it as a strategic asset. Character strengths Stability, change, and relationships with well-being changes. Seligman, M. E. P., and Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2000). Another group (perspective, perseverance, zest, love, social intelligence, teamwork, gratitude, and hope) showed mostly unique contributions of the VIA-IS scales and common variance. Table 1. The remaining authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest. To date, very little research has considered the role of character strengths in leisure activities. doi: 10.1007/s11482-018-9695-z, Wagner, L., Holenstein, M., Wepf, H., and Ruch, W. (2020b). 1. It's the little things: everyday gratitude as a boostershot for romantic relationships. Lavy et al. Supplementary Tables 2, 3 show the descriptive statistics of the ACS-RS for each of the life domains, separately for relevance and strengths-related behavior. doi: 10.1080/17439760.2012.758305, Coghlan, A., and Filo, K. (2016). (2013). Previous studies have provided consistent support for the relationship of the 24 character strengths described in the VIA classification with various facets of well-being and flourishing (e.g., Peterson et al., 2007; Proyer et al., 2011, 2013; Buschor et al., 2013; Martnez-Mart and Ruch, 2014; Hausler et al., 2017a; Gander et al., 2020c; Wagner et al., 2020a). Regression commonality analysis: a technique for quantitative theory building. However, it also yielded the highest standard deviations in both variables (relevance and strengths-related behavior); that is, a stronger variability between individuals was observed for spirituality than for other character strengths. 8, 116127. It shows for each character strength and life domain how many effectsout of a maximum of four: (1) it was perceived as more relevant than the mean across the life domains, (2) it was displayed more frequently than the mean across the life domains, (3) the relevance in the life domain was related to flourishing, and (4) the display of strengths-related behavior in the life domain was related to flourishingwere found and whether these effects had been hypothesized. The role of a good character in 12-year-old school children: do character strengths matter in the classroom? Life 15, 551572. Individuals who are currently in romantic relationships or cohabitating with a partner report a different trait levels of some character strengths compared with those without romantic relationships or living alone, as demonstrated by Karris Bachik et al. Get emails with tips and tools for your strengths-building journey. They are more likely to learn something out of a situation than someone who avoids their ignorance altogether. Symposium Conducted at the 3rd World Congress on Positive Psychology, ed R. Niemiec (Chair) (Los Angeles, CA). The impact of signature character strengths interventions: a meta-analysis. Speak to an expert in this area to get recommendations for good resources. Leverage Curiosity to learn about yourself and increase your self-awareness. The "glasses" that we wear when looking at the world. Enable it. J. doi: 10.1177/0272431618791286, Wagner, L., Gander, F., Proyer, R. T., and Ruch, W. (2020a). Res. To be curious is to explore and discover, to take an interest in ongoing experience for its own sake. Hum. The sample consisted of 203 German-speaking adults (21.2% men, 78.8% women) who were primarily living in Switzerland (66.5%) and Germany (30%). Social Curiosity wanting to know what other people are thinking and doing by observing, talking, or listening in to conversations. Career Dev. Character strengths and well-being across the life span: data from a representative sample of German-speaking adults living in Switzerland. We wanted to be able to detect a correlation of r = 0.30 with a power of at least 0.80 (and an -level of 0.01 using two-tailed tests). Several limitations need to be considered when interpreting the results of the present study. For 18 character strengths, the VIA-IS scales and strengths-related behavior jointly explained a small but relevant proportion of the variance of flourishing (with a contribution of common variance of at least R2 = 0.02), further supporting the role of strengths-related behavior across life domains in explaining variance in flourishing. We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. The novelty of this had piqued my curiosity a few months ago. Finally, differences in character strengths have been observed in working versus retired individuals after controlling for age in a sample representing middle adulthood to old age, although the observed effects were small (Baumann et al., 2020). Gander et al. Satisfaction with leisure time assessed globally was found to relate positively to curiosity, zest, love, gratitude, hope, and humor (Ruch et al., 2010)a set of character strengths almost identical to those that consistently show the highest correlations with life satisfaction (e.g., Buschor et al., 2013), so this finding might not be specific to leisure activities per se. We increase our wisdom as we become more open to new experiences and make new discoveries. Studies demonstrate that (a) several character strengths are related to educational outcomes, including school-related well-being, positive classroom behavior, and school achievement; (b) these associations are robust when controlling for the influence of cognitive ability; and (c) there is a differential pattern of associations depending on the outcome of interest (e.g., prudence and self-regulation seem to be of particular relevance for positive classroom behavior), but certain character strengths (in particular, perseverance and love of learning) seem to be of general relevance in the educational setting (e.g., Park and Peterson, 2006; Weber and Ruch, 2012a; Wagner and Ruch, 2015, 2021; Weber et al., 2016; Wagner et al., 2020b). In a sample of adolescents, the character strengths of perspective, honesty, love, kindness, social intelligence, teamwork, leadership, gratitude, and humor were identified as most relevant for positive peer relationships across several analyses (desired characteristics in a friend, associations with likeability, number of friends, and friendship quality and satisfaction; Wagner, 2019). One of these criteria is that character strengths are trait-like characteristics, which demonstrate relative stability across time and different situations. Front. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-6811.2010.01273.x, Allan, B. Strengths-related behavior in the context of close personal relationships has been shown to relate to mood regulation: in their quasi-experimental diary study, Lavy et al. Toronto, ON, The environmental demands or rewards for showing strengths-related behavior are assumed to represent a shared perception by everyone in that environment, which is supported by findings that suggest a considerable agreement between different raters regarding the relevance of character strengths in a given context (Harzer and Ruch, 2013). Moreover, strengths-related behavior across different life domains explained additional variance in flourishing beyond the trait level of each respective character strength for a number of character strengths. doi: 10.1080/01490400.2015.1087355, Diener, E., Wirtz, D., Tov, W., Kim-Prieto, C., Choi, D., Oishi, S., et al. 9, 335349. From these findings, we derive hypotheses on which character strengths are of particular relevance in each respective life domain. To go to a new restaurant, visit a new city, meet a new person in your class, or to conduct an online search for a question can each fulfill your quest for new experiences and new information. In addition, love of learning has also been found to relate to the educational level obtained in adults, hinting at its general relevance for education (Ruch et al., 2010). Family Issues 37, 17301745. What good are character strengths beyond subjective well-being? Table 4. In the present study, the median Cronbach's was 0.79. Individual Differ. Personal. This global assessment was positively related to overall well-being and meaning (in both life and work) across both groups. For instance, in the domain of education, it would be interesting to investigate to which extent the context of school differs from the context of higher education. doi: 10.1007/s11482-018-9699-8, Kachel, T., Huber, A., Strecker, C., Hge, T., and Hfer, S. (2020). Values in Action Inventory of Strengths (VIA-IS): adaptation and validation of the German version and the development of a peer-rating form. J. The editor and reviewer's affiliations are the latest provided on their Loop research profiles and may not reflect their situation at the time of review. Please use an alternative browser such as, Curiosity is a strength within the virtue category of wisdom, one of six virtues that subcategorize the 24 strengths. Is now available in an authorized German version (FS-D): application in mind-body medicine. For the life domain of work, for example, each character strength is described and rated on these four items: (a) It is encouraged in my professional life, (b) It is helpful in my professional life, (c) It is important to me in my professional life, and (d) I behave like this in my professional life. People with a high CQ thrive off of learning new things and would be able to pick up a new software or technology with ease. This initiative is particularly valued in a startup environment where employees are often required to juggle multiple roles in the company. Positive Psychol. Praise question-asking: What a great question! Both tables also indicate the results of the t-tests comparing the means in each respective life domain with the overall mean across all life domains. Specifically, we investigated whether (a) strengths-related behavior across different life domains explained additional variance in flourishing beyond the contribution of character strengths as traits, (b) life domains differed concerning the perceived relevance of character strengths as well as the frequency of their display, and (c) perceived relevance and strengths-related behavior across life domains were related to a global assessment of flourishing.