Description
The scientific study of psychological well-being in adolescence is an attractive area with a promising future, but its history is more recent than that of other psychosocial constructions. A deeper knowledge of this stage of life is key for the design of prevention programmes which are better adapted to the problems which adolescents may have. The most important limitations to its study today are basically epistemological and relate to the problem of finding common visions (as much in terms of definitions as in terms of explanatory theories) shared by a majority of social researchers. Complexity theories offer a productive alternative in this respect, since the characteristics in which complexity is grounded are, in fact, the same properties which characterise psychosocial phenomena. This includes psychological well-being. However, the data available, obtained by means of a cross-sectional study, prevent an approach to psychological well-being from any of the properties of complexity with the exception of the characteristic of non-linearity.nn nExploring the elements of psychological well-being is one of the approach strategies used in its study. This doctoral thesis has chosen some of those elements which emerge from the scientific literature as being more closely connected with psychological well-being: satisfaction with life as a whole and satisfaction with specific domains in life, self-esteem and perceived social support, perception of control and values. The overall aim was to use the data obtained to build a model of psychological well-being which would permit this phenomenon to be understood from a more integrated and holistic point of view and, as a consequence, offer a more comprehensive way of approaching the phenomenon.