Tracing the size, reach, impact and breadth of positive psychology

What is it about?

This article outlines the growth of positive psychology (PP) literature. It quantitatively analyses over 1.7 million documents in 700 PsycINFO(R) journals using textual analysis and bibliographic methods. Results indicate that PP literature has been growing rapidly in significance, with over 18,000 documents identified as belonging to the field. The maps indicate the topics that PP to date has researched, and how those topics relate to other disciplines.

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Why is it important?

Despite widespread claims that positive psychology (PP) is growing rapidly, relatively few quantitative analyses have been provided to support this claim. This is one of the largest quantitative analyses of positive psychology as a broad field to date, and shows that PP has indeed been growing rapidly. This study also provides a quantitative assessment of the breadth of topics covered within PP literature to date.