{"id":40898,"date":"2016-09-09T14:52:31","date_gmt":"2016-09-09T18:52:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/?p=40898"},"modified":"2016-09-09T15:54:07","modified_gmt":"2016-09-09T19:54:07","slug":"brock-researchers-receive-3-7-million-funding-from-federal-granting-agency-sshrc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/2016\/09\/brock-researchers-receive-3-7-million-funding-from-federal-granting-agency-sshrc\/","title":{"rendered":"Brock researchers receive $3.7 million funding from federal granting agency SSHRC"},"content":{"rendered":"

Psychologist Michael Busseri\u2019s study of happiness is one of 18 research projects at Brock University awarded funds from the federal granting agency Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC).
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On September 9, SSHRC announced this year\u2019s research grants for post-secondary researchers across Canada. Brock was awarded more than $3.7 million in three competitions for the 2016 funding year.<\/p>\n

Busseri studies how various groups\u00a0of people \u2013 young, old, optimistic, pessimistic, happy, sad \u2013 think about their lives over time and how they view whether or not life will get better in the future.<\/p>\n

He predicts that a new indicator may be popping up in many countries\u2019 statistics in the near future: Gross National Happiness.<\/p>\n

Coined in Bhutan in the early 1970s, the idea is to estimate peoples\u2019 sense of well-being \u201cwith the growing understanding that a happy society that feels they have meaning, purpose and satisfaction is also a more productive society,\u201d says Busseri.<\/p>\n

The Associate Professor of Psychology will be expanding his research worldwide, comparing Canadians\u2019 perceptions of well-being to those of populations around the world using an international database that tracks these perceptions.<\/p>\n

He will also examine countries\u2019 economic and social indicators \u2013 gross domestic product, infant mortality, education, access to democratic institutions, etc. \u2013 to see if there is a relationship between peoples\u2019 beliefs about their well-being and how the country they are living in is performing economically and socially over time.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnderstanding this at a global level may help inform social policies or at the very least give us information about society and how it sees itself changing over time,\u201d says Busseri. \u201cThis information may be useful not only to lay persons but also to governments.\u201d<\/p>\n

Busseri can do this research thanks to an Insight Grant he received from SSHRC.<\/p>\n

With her Insight Development Grant, Assistant Professor of Recreation & Leisure Studies Colleen Whyte is examining the impact of \u201cdeep and sustained\u201d friendships between people living with dementia and their long-standing friends.<\/p>\n

Whyte and her team will interview people living with dementia and their friends about the meaning of their friendships, strategies they use to maintain the friendships, ways they use leisure activities to stay connected, and advice they may have for others in a similar situation.<\/p>\n

The researchers say their results can be used to help people maintain their friendships.<\/p>\n

\u201cGiven that the number of Canadians living with dementia is expected to double to over 1.1 million by 2035, more attention must be directed toward understanding ways to ensure that individuals with dementia remain engaged with their network of friends in personally meaningful ways,\u201d says Whyte.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen people living with dementia can depend on valued friends, they continue to contribute to the social life of their communities, remain engaged in personally meaningful leisure activities and experience feelings of self-worth,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Brock researchers receiving Insight Grants in the 2016 round are:<\/p>\n