Optimization: an attempt to establish empirical evidence for theoretical and practical purposes

Abstract

<i>Optimal best practice</i> is a central feat of human agency. It emphasizes a state of flourishing and reflects, in this case, the paradigm of positive psychology. One research inquiry that is of interest relates to an explanatory account of how a person reaches a state of optimal best. Recent research development has considered an important psychological process, known as <i>optimization</i>, which may explain a person’s achievement of optimal best practice. Having said this, very little is known about the process of optimization. In this article, the authors report on a non-experimental study (<i>N</i> = 352 secondary school students), which focused on the testing of a theoretical model of optimization. Innovatively, derived from existing theorizations and empirical evidence, the authors provide a methodological rationalization of flourishing, which is defined as a “quantitative difference” between a person’s current level of best practice (denoted as L₁) and his/her optimal level of best practice (denoted as L₂). Structural equation modeling (SEM) indicated a few major findings, for example, (i) a positive association between a person’s optimal best practice and his/her academic performance in a subject matter, (ii) a person’s current level of best practice acts as a determinant of optimal best practice, and (iii) personal resolve, as a psychological optimizing agent, directly influences optimal best practice, and potentially mediating the effects of academic striving and a person’s current level of best practice on optimal best practice.