The Power of Belonging

The feeling of belonging is powerful factor in how people cope with stress and in overall well-being. Greg Walton of Stanford University and colleagues have developed relatively simple interventions to aid people in feeling as though they belong to a particular group. 

In various studies, the interventions have increased subjects' happiness, improved their health, and reduced cognitive activation of negative stereotypes, as reported on CNN this week. The interventions are particularly effective for closing the achievement gap for minority students and women in male-dominated majors – for example, improving first-year grades for female engineering students by helping them feel like they belong in the major while teaching them how to better cope with stress. Walton discussed this research at the SPSP 2012 annual meeting in January in San Diego.