Teaching well-being/quality of life from a philosophical perspective

Abstract

Before academic disciplines were invented, philosophers were teaching their students about the good life. These days, academics from a broad range of disciplines, including philosophy, teach their students about various aspects of well-being or quality of life. This chapter discusses the methods, topics, and perspectives that characterise a philosophical approach to teaching well-being or quality of life, focussing especially on how to create and critique a theory of well-being. While discussing these features of the philosophical approach, key differences with other mainly social scientific approaches to teaching well-being and quality of life will be highlighted. Then the chapter discusses some ideas about how to teach well-being and quality of life in a methodologically informed way, one that enables students to critique the methods used by a range of well-being and quality of life researchers, especially those used by philosophers. The chapter concludes with some suggestions on how to harness the subject matter in a way that creates an engaging undergraduate-level course on well-being and quality of life.