Sarah Backhouse has spent 20+ years briefing and evaluating workplace and learning environment projects, focusing on their sociocultural environments as much as their constructed environments. Increasingly, health and wellbeing feature as building project objectives. However, “health and wellbeing” is often a catchall term, interpreted differently across individuals, cultures and professions. This short post explores the nexus between integrative briefing and mental wellbeing.

Mental Wellbeing

Mental wellbeing and mental health are distinct concepts yet frequently conflated. Mental health spans a continuum from mental illness to good mental health, and mental wellbeing spans from languishing to flourishing[i]. This dual continuum model[ii],[iii] explains why mentally healthy people sometimes struggle, and those with mental illness can thrive with environmental support. Promoting mental wellbeing is a positive goal across contexts as it underpins people feeling good and moving towards their full potential; it also has a protective dimension.

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