Unit Synopsis
In this unit you will learn how the fundamental principles and theories of positive psychology can be applied to the design, development, and measurement of evidence-based interventions for enhancing the wellbeing and resilience of individuals and groups across a range of settings such as education, health, and organisations. The exploration of practical applications will include designing and implementing a positive psychology intervention, examining determinants of change, and developing ways to measure and monitor efficacy and change processes.
Details
| Level | Postgraduate |
|---|---|
| Unit Level | 9 |
| Credit Points | 6 |
| Student Contribution Band | SCA Band 4 |
| Fraction of Full-Time Student Load | 0.125 |
| Pre-requisites or Co-requisites |
There are no pre-requisites for the unit.
Important note: Students enrolled in a subsequent unit who failed their pre-requisite unit, should drop the subsequent unit before the census date or within 10 working days of Fail grade notification. Students who do not drop the unit in this timeframe cannot later drop the unit without academic and financial liability. See details in the Assessment Policy and Procedure (Higher Education Coursework). |
| Class Timetable | View Unit Timetable |
| Residential School | No Residential School |
Unit Availabilities from Term 2 - 2025
Attendance Requirements
All on-campus students are expected to attend scheduled classes - in some units, these classes are identified as a mandatory (pass/fail) component and attendance is compulsory. International students, on a student visa, must maintain a full time study load and meet both attendance and academic progress requirements in each study period (satisfactory attendance for International students is defined as maintaining at least an 80% attendance record).
Recommended Student Time Commitment
Each 6-credit Postgraduate unit at CQUniversity requires an overall time commitment of an average of 12.5 hours of study per week, making a total of 150 hours for the unit.
Assessment Tasks
| Assessment Task | Weighting |
|---|---|
| 1. Written Assessment | 40% |
| 2. Practical Assessment | 40% |
| 3. Reflective Practice Assignment | 20% |
This is a graded unit: your overall grade will be calculated from the marks or grades for each assessment task, based on the relative weightings shown in the table above. You must obtain an overall mark for the unit of at least 50%, or an overall grade of ‘pass’ in order to pass the unit. If any ‘pass/fail’ tasks are shown in the table above they must also be completed successfully (‘pass’ grade). You must also meet any minimum mark requirements specified for a particular assessment task, as detailed in the ‘assessment task’ section (note that in some instances, the minimum mark for a task may be greater than 50%).
Past Exams
All University policies are available on the Policy web site, however you may wish to directly view the following policies below.
This list is not an exhaustive list of all University policies. The full list of policies are available on the Policy web site .
Term 2 - 2025 : The overall satisfaction for students in the last offering of this course was 66.67% (`Agree` and `Strongly Agree` responses), based on a 16.44% response rate.
Feedback, Recommendations and Responses
Every unit is reviewed for enhancement each year. At the most recent review, the following staff and student feedback items were identified and recommendations were made.
Source: SUTE responses and Unit Coordinator reflections.
Some students struggled with groupwork, which may have been exacerbated by allocating some students into groups without their input.
The Unit Coordinator and teaching team will investigate alternative strategies for allocating students to groups.
In 2024, students who had not joined a group by the end of week 3 were randomly allocated at the start of week 4. In 2025, the process changed: students who were still without a group by week 4 were assigned to a single large temporary group. By the end of week 5, they were allowed to select their own teammates from within that group and divide into two smaller groups. This ensured that even if they missed the initial deadline, they could still choose their group members.
Source: SUTE responses.
While some students valued the chance to work and learn collaboratively with fellow students in the group assessment, other students found it challenging due to unequal contributions, scheduling challenges, and varied skill-levels.
The Unit Coordinator and teaching team will investigate alternative strategies for fostering effective groupwork and equal distribution of work roles by students in their teams, and utilise the groupwork contract as a way to facilitate this.
In tutorials, the unit coordinator introduced simple methods to share tasks fairly, ensuring everyone had a clear role and responsibility. Students were also encouraged to use quick, accessible communication tools, such as WhatsApp, to stay connected and coordinate more easily, rather than relying solely on email.
Source: SUTE responses.
Some students felt they would have benefitted from a larger word count for Assessment 2 individual reflection.
The Unit Coordinator and teaching team will re-evaluate the appropriateness of word limits for assessment components.
To address feedback on the word limit in Assessment Two, some of the reflection content was moved to Assessment Three. This gave students more space to expand on their ideas and provide deeper reflection, while keeping Assessment 2 focused and manageable.
Source: SUTE responses.
Some students felt the delivery style could be more engaging and that there was limited opportunity to see how positive psychology interventions apply in different real-world contexts.
Learning materials will be updated to incorporate more interactive elements, such as case studies and consideration given to the addition of more guest speakers from varied professional fields, to broaden perspectives and increase engagement.
In Progress
Source: SUTE responses.
Feedback indicated that weekly content did not always align clearly with assessment tasks, and the assessment sequencing created challenges for workload management.
The unit structure and assessment timing will be reviewed to create a clearer alignment between weekly topics and assessments. The length of the written assessment will be adjusted to provide a more balanced workload.
In Progress
Source: SUTE responses.
Students noted that the group assignment was intensive and that the assessment instructions were overly complex.
The unit coordinator will investigate strategies for simplifying and streamlining the assessments without compromising the achievement of learning outcomes.
In Progress
On successful completion of this unit, you will be able to:
- Apply effective decision making and problem solving to the application of positive psychology tools in real-world situations
- Design a protocol for appropriately administering and measuring an applied Positive Psychology intervention
- Apply and evaluate behaviour change processes for self-administered positive psychology interventions
- Develop and apply reflective-practice skills, to reflect on your ongoing development of knowledge and practitioner skills in the positive psychology/wellbeing domain, and also reflect on your personal development during the Unit.
N/A - no external accreditation.
| Assessment Tasks | Learning Outcomes | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | |
| 1 - Written Assessment | • | • | ||
| 2 - Practical Assessment | • | • | • | • |
| 3 - Reflective Practice Assignment | • | • | ||
| Graduate Attributes | Learning Outcomes | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | |
| 1 - Knowledge | • | • | • | • |
| 2 - Communication | • | • | • | |
| 3 - Cognitive, technical and creative skills | • | • | ||
| 4 - Research | • | • | • | |
| 5 - Self-management | • | • | ||
| 6 - Ethical and Professional Responsibility | • | • | ||
| 7 - Leadership | • | |||
| Assessment Tasks | Graduate Attributes | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 8 | |