How We Thrive: The focus of our research
The goals of our research agenda include:
- advancing understanding of how well-being, health, and disease are affected by one’s psychological state and the social environments in which they interact
- educating students, parents, educators, and public policy leaders about the ways health impacts people, communities, and societies
- putting our research to use in real world settings
The Berger Institute conducts its own research and supports innovative and collaborative research between faculty and students at the Claremont Colleges. Our research is guided by two major views:
- Bio-ecological Systems Theory Approach, which argues that multiple environmental and individual subsystems play important roles in influencing development across a person’s lifespan.
- Cultural Fit Hypothesis, which emphasizes the person-situation interaction and highlights how processes may vary across cultures and contexts.
By incorporating both of these views into our research, we are able to find multiple solutions to a single problem. Since people have different strengths and ways of thinking, providing a variety of solutions will facilitate healthy adaptation and development for a larger number of people.
A selection of our publications can be found at the Scholarship@Claremont repository.