Rate My Professor Aaron Jarden

Aaron Jarden served as Associate Professor of Applied Positive Psychology in the Faculty of Education at the University of Melbourne, where he directed the Masters of Applied Positive Psychology program at the Centre for Positive Psychology in the Melbourne Graduate School of Education. His academic background includes a PhD in psychology from the University of Canterbury completed in 2010, a Postgraduate Certificate in Tertiary Teaching from New Zealand in 2012, a Master of Arts from New Zealand in 2004, a Graduate Diploma in Applied Ethics from New Zealand in 2000, a Bachelor of Social Sciences with Honours from New Zealand in 1999, and a Master of Teaching in Early Childhood and Primary education. Prior appointments include Senior Research Fellow at Flinders University and Head of Research at the Wellbeing and Resilience Centre at the South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute.

Jarden's research focuses on positive psychology and the science of wellbeing, with particular emphasis on wellbeing assessment, the application of wellbeing programs, and achieving scalable and sustainable impacts from wellbeing initiatives. He founded and served as past president of the New Zealand Association of Positive Psychology, founded and co-edited the International Journal of Wellbeing, and led the International Wellbeing Study as principal investigator. Key publications include the co-edited book Wellbeing, recovery and mental health (Cambridge University Press, 2017), Different types of well-being? A cross-cultural examination of hedonic and eudaimonic well-being (Psychological Assessment, 2016), What is wellbeing? (International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2023), and Measuring flourishing: The impact of operational definitions on the prevalence of high levels of wellbeing (International Journal of Wellbeing, 2014). He received the Melbourne Graduate School of Education Teaching Excellence Award in 2020. Jarden also works as a wellbeing consultant and senior scientist for Work on Wellbeing, contributing to practical implementations in education and organizational contexts.