An Exploratory Study of Resilience Among Hong Kong Employees: Ways to Happiness

At the turn of the 21st century, a positive psychology approach is strongly advocated in the United States. Many American psychologists have turned their attention from repairing weakness and damage to promoting human virtues (Seligman 2002). According to Seligman (2002), “the aim of positive psychology is to catalyze a change in psychology from a preoccupation only with repairing the worst things in life to also building the best qualities in life (p. 3)”. Seligman further suggested that there are human strengths that can act as buffers against stressed mental illness. These buffers are courage, optimism, interpersonal skills, faith, hope, honesty, perseverance, resilience, putting troubles into perspective, and finding purpose.