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BRIEF RESEARCH REPORT article

Front. Educ.

Sec. Mental Health and Wellbeing in Education

Happiness Capital: Resources for Student Well-Being

Provisionally accepted
Albert ZieglerAlbert Ziegler1*Salaheldin Farah BakhietSalaheldin Farah Bakhiet2Ahmed Nabawy Abdou IssaAhmed Nabawy Abdou Issa3Yossry Ahmed Sayed EssaYossry Ahmed Sayed Essa3Nick Naujoks-SchoberNick Naujoks-Schober4
  • 1Department of Psychology, Friedrich-Alexander-Universitat Erlangen-Nurnberg, Erlangen, Germany
  • 2Department of Special Education, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
  • 3Department of Special Education, Arish University, Arish, Egypt
  • 4Ansbach University of Applied Sciences, Ansbach, Germany

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This study explores a resource-based perspective on subjective well-being in educational contexts by introducing the concept of happiness capital. Building on the Educational and Learning Capital Approach, we adapted existing measures to assess how personal and environmental resources contribute to students' well-being. In a sample of 1,528 Egyptian secondary school students, perceived happiness capital significantly predicted life satisfaction, positive and negative emotions across all age groups. These findings suggest that the same resource structures supporting learning can foster emotional flourishing. We briefly discuss implications for resource-based models of well-being in education and propose directions for future research.

Keywords: Subjective well-being, learning resources, happiness, actiotope, Multivariate regression

Received: 12 Aug 2025; Accepted: 10 Nov 2025.

Copyright: © 2025 Ziegler, Bakhiet, Issa, Essa and Naujoks-Schober. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence: Albert Ziegler, albert.ziegler@fau.de

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

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