Well-being in music education through PERMA and eudaimonia
OA Version
Citation
Abstract
Music directors may want to develop fundamental strategies to ensure student well-being while striving toward musical excellence. This is especially important when music programs are building and/or recovering from hardships that impact programs, or individual students. Well-being can be thought of in terms of a psychologically positive affect in the absence of malaise. Happiness lies within well-being, and can be conceived as hedonia and eudaimonia. Hedonia refers to more immediate personal gratification, which varies greatly from person to person, whereas eudaimonia refers to happiness in pursuit of virtue, and is therefore a better model for educational settings. Directors who adopt a eudaimonic approach with the goal of flourishing can mutually benefit teacher and student well-being. The PERMA model of well-being is an excellent tool for teachers to re-evaluate content and methodology. Curriculum and social interaction that prioritize Positive Emotion, Engagement, Relationships, Meaning, and Accomplishment may enhance and increase teacher and student well-being and optimal eudaimonia. Well-being is an important factor in determining long-term success of students. Prioritizing well-being benefits students and teachers. In this qualitative study, I interviewed six people who experienced interruptions in their music education experiences, investigating their well-being within the PERMA framework, and observations of their directors’ respective eudaimonic approaches. I codified their key words and compared non-verbal affect when they shared their stories of early experiences, how they felt during the interruption, and what changed when they resumed musical experiences. Using the PERMA model to analyze themselves, their students, and their overall program may be an efficient tool to evaluate well-being in the context of music education. For most participants, well-being suffered when music education ceased. Five of the six participants returned to study music, finding their well-being increased, however in different PERMA components than their root experiences. Further, connections to their directors, and the perceived care they gave to student flourishing, impacted the quality of their experiences, and subsequently, the overall well-being of the students.
Developing strategies to prioritize well-being is an important factor in creating flourishing music programs, especially when an interruption in music learning has occurred, whether experienced by an individual student suffering hardship, or impacts to the overall program. Flourishing can be thought of as the optimal objective.
Description
2026
License
Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International