Positive Technology Supports Shift to Preventive, Integrative Health

Abstract

We find it gratifying to see the movement of psychology from the disease focus of the last 100 years to a potentially new focus on well-being for the next 100 years. The positive psychology movement, and its positive technology counterpart proposed by us and our colleagues in this issue, may have had its official birth in 1998, but its roots date back at least to the concept of ‘‘healthy mindedness’’ at the beginning of the 20th century. Just as positive psychology can be defined as the scientific study of human functioning, so can positive technology be defined as the scientific approach to using technology to improve the quality of our personal experience through its structuring, augmentation, and/or replacement. Examples of such technology include: