• Skip to content
  • Skip to footer
  • Accessibility options
University of Brighton
  • About us
  • Business and
    employers
  • Alumni and
    supporters
  • For
    students
  • For
    staff
  • Accessibility
    options
Open menu
Home
Home
  • Close
  • Study here
    • Courses and subjects
    • Find a course
    • A-Z course list
    • Explore our subjects
    • Academic departments
    • Visiting the university
    • Explore: get to know us
    • Upcoming events
    • Virtual tours
    • Chat to our students and staff
    • Open days
    • Applicant days
    • Order a prospectus
    • Ask a question
    • Studying here
    • Accommodation and locations
    • Applying
    • Undergraduate
    • Postgraduate
    • Transferring from another university
    • The Student Contract
    • Clearing
    • International students
    • Fees and finance
    • Advice and help
    • Advice for students
    • Advice for parents and carers
    • Advice for schools and teachers
    • Managing your application
    • Undergraduate
    • Postgraduate
    • Apprenticeships
  • Research
    • Research and knowledge exchange
    • Research and knowledge exchange organisation
    • The Global Challenges
    • Centres of Research Excellence (COREs)
    • Research Excellence Groups (REGs)
    • Our research database
    • Information for business
    • Community University Partnership Programme (CUPP)
    • Postgraduate research degrees
    • PhD research disciplines and programmes
    • PhD funding opportunities and studentships
    • How to apply for your PhD
    • Research environment
    • Investing in research careers
    • Strategic plan
    • Research concordat
    • News, events, publications and films
    • Featured research and knowledge exchange projects
    • Research and knowledge exchange news
    • Inaugural lectures
    • Research and knowledge exchange publications and films
    • Academic staff search
  • About us
  • Business and employers
  • Alumni, supporters and giving
  • Current students
  • Staff
  • Accessibility
Search our site
Research-project-banner
Research and knowledge exchange
  • Postgraduate research degrees
  • Research features
  • Research organisation
  • Research environment
  • Groups
    • Groups
    • Applied geosciences
    • Built environment
    • Biomaterials and Drug Delivery
    • Brighton and Sussex Medicines Optimisation
    • Chemistry
    • Stress, ageing and disease
    • Ecosystems and environmental management
    • Education
    • Environment and public health
    • Healthcare Practice and Rehabilitation
    • Interdisciplinary Management and Higher Education
    • Management and Employment
    • Mathematics, Statistics and Operations
    • Musculoskeletal
    • Nuclear physics
    • Past human and environment dynamics
    • Paediatrics
    • Product design
    • Sensory neuroscience
    • Social Science Policy
    • Society space and environment
    • Sport and Exercise Science and Medicine
    • Sport, Tourism and Leisure
    • Sustainability and Resilience Engineering
    • Transforming sexuality and gender
    • Values and sustainability
  • Healthcare Practice and Rehabilitation
    • Healthcare Practice and Rehabilitation
    • Research impact
    • Research areas
    • Research projects
    • Collaborations
    • Events
    • About us
  • Research projects
    • Research projects
    • Action for Health
    • Activity Buddies
    • Activity Buddies: promoting quality of life for older people together
    • Addressing the social determinants of health
    • Alumni experiences of group research projects
    • Assessing stress, protective factors and psychological well-being among undergraduate students
    • Benchmarking Regional Health Management (BEN)
    • Breakfast and satiety
    • Breaking down barriers and improving quality of life for wheelchair users
    • Brighton and Hove as a healthy city
    • CEIHPAL
    • Communicating risks of treatment to patients
    • Compassionate nursing care in an acute care trust
    • Complaints and claims against osteopaths
    • Developing a health promoting university
    • Developing a psychosocial index
    • Developing Interprofessional Education
    • Developing the theoretical construct of Flow
    • Development of the PBL directory as a research tool
    • Dynamic pressure measurement
    • Eastbourne local food project
    • ECHIM
    • EDA - Eastbourne designed for all
    • Efficacy-of-intravenous-vs-oral-paracetamol-for-lower-wisdom-tooth-extraction
    • Engaging fathers in supporting breastfeeding
    • Enhancing learning and patient care
    • EUMAHP
    • EUPHID
    • EURODOC
    • Evaluating physiotherapist and podiatrist independent prescribing
    • Evaluation of sexual health services
    • Exploration of the flow process
    • Exploring embroiderers stories
    • Exploring the nature and extent of foot complaints in rheumatoid arthritis
    • Fit as a fiddle
    • Foot and ankle injuries footballers
    • Foot characteristics in gout, diabetes and chronic kidney disease
    • Foot complaints in Lupus
    • Footwear selection in women with RA
    • Further explorations into the conundrum of flow process
    • Gardening and older people
    • GRADIENT
    • Health improvement commissioning
    • Health through volunteering
    • HEPCOM
    • IMHPA
    • Improving motor function for children with cerebral palsy
    • Improving student's perception of attainment
    • Introducing meaningful activity onto hospital wards
    • Lifestyle matters
    • Lumbar spine mobilisations
    • Management of posterior leg pain
    • Measurement of ADLs in two different wheelchairs
    • Measurement of hand/handrim grip forces
    • Measures in EMG in one-arm drive wheelchairs
    • Modelling sexual healthcare for substance misusing women
    • NowHereLand
    • Occupational therapy
    • Occupational therapy students' experiences of role-emerging placements
    • Occupational therapy supporting people with profound intellectual disabilities to engage in occupation at home
    • One-hand user wheelchair development
    • Osteopathy research priorities
    • Our space
    • Pain and quality of life in paralympic sports participants
    • PHETICE
    • Physiotherapy students' lived experiences
    • Play and Cerebral Palsy
    • Primary science learning objectives in a PBL curriculum
    • Retain project
    • Self-forgetting as a therapeutic property of occupation
    • Self-management of acute and chronic low back disorders
    • Significant walks
    • Situational awareness of patient deterioration
    • Small Steps
    • Standardised data collection in osteopathy
    • Student nurses' anxiety and the management of simulated patient deterioration
    • Students' experiences of learning and approaches to studying
    • Support for newly qualified clinical practitioners
    • The haemophilia and HIV life history project
    • The influence of the 'by learning objective' module
    • The lived experience of active Charcot Foot in Diabetes Mellitus
    • The OPEn project
    • The PARO project
    • The risks of childbirth in historical perspective
    • The use of exercise in physiotherapy
    • Trans-Atlantic Exchange Partnerships
    • University Campus E-bikes research
    • User evaluation of the Neater Uni-wheelchair
    • Vertical reaction forces of three different one-arm drive wheelchairs
    • Volunteering for health
  • Exploration of the flow process

Exploration of the flow process

This project continues to evaluate the theoretical construct of ‘flow’ and the current measurements of ‘flow’. It has already developed understanding of this human optimal experience by describing how the phenomenon is experienced before, during and afterwards. Flow has been distinguished from other states of consciousness, such as mindfulness and positive distraction.

A later stage of the research examines flow within different levels of skilled occupation, and, examined the relationship between ‘flow’ and mental health/wellbeing applying Reversal Theory.

Project objectives

A phenomenological approach was taken to examine the flow experiences of seven participants. The method included participants keeping journals and semi-structured interviews. The flow process seemed to vary because of apparent differences between the participants’ experiences: challenge-skills, enjoyment, positive distraction and mindfulness. These phenomena had similarities, as all participants described them as positive psychological states that were a consequence of being absorbed in an occupation.

Project impact

Differences appeared to include prior affect and the degree of challenge an occupation presented. This research has highlighted the importance of meaning and the essential role occupation may have in protecting wellbeing. Occupations may lead to optimal experience when they lead to altered and ordered states of consciousness

This study is to be continued, following participation in the international Flow conference “The Concept of Flow: Towards a Scientific Integration”, Braunschweig,

Research team

An exploration of the Flow Process
Dr Jon Wright 
Professor Gaynor Sadlo
Dr Graham Stew

Output

Publications

Wright JJ, Wright S, Sadlo G & Stew G 2014 Exploring Optimal Experiences: A Reversal Theory Perspective of Flow and Occupational Science.  Journal of Occupational Science 21(2) 173-187.

Wright JJ, Wright S, Sadlo G & Stew G 2014 A Reversal Theory Exploration of Flow Process and the Flow Channel.  Journal of Occupational Science 21(2) 188-201.

Wright J, Wright S, Sadlo G, & Stew G 2012 Exploring optimal experiences: a reversal theory perspective of flow and occupational scienceJournal Of Occupational Science . ISSN 1442-7591

Wright JJ, Sadlo G, Stew G 2007  Further Explorations of Flow Process. Journal of Occupational Science.  14 (3) 136-144

Wright JJ,Sadlo G,Stew G 2006 Challenge-skills and mindfulness: the conundrum of flow process.  Occupational Therapy Journal of Research: Occupation, Participation and Health.   26(1):25-32 ISSN: 1539-4492.

Partners

Back to top
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • TikTok
  • YouTube
  • LinkedIn icon

Contact us

University of Brighton
Mithras House
Lewes Road
Brighton
BN2 4AT

Main switchboard 01273 600900

Course enquiries

Sign up for updates

University contacts

Report a problem with this page

Quick links Quick links

  • Courses
  • Open days
  • Order a prospectus
  • Academic departments
  • Academic staff
  • Professional services departments
  • Jobs
  • Privacy and cookie policy
  • Accessibility statement
  • Libraries
  • Term dates
  • Maps
  • Graduation
  • Site information
  • Online shop
  • COVID-19

Information for Information for

  • Current students
  • International students
  • Media/press
  • Careers advisers/teachers
  • Parents/carers
  • Business/employers
  • Alumni/supporters
  • Suppliers
  • Local residents