My research on hope began with the development of a new theory of hope. This required nearly ten years or work. During this time, I also began to craft the hope tests that you see on this website. My current research is focused on interventions (therapies) to build or restore hope in children, teens, adults, and U.S. military personnel and veterans. If you have perused the rest of this website, you know that I approach hope from the perspective of four basic needs: attachment, mastery, survival, and spirituality. The interventions that I am developing will include strategies for building or restoring these four cornerstones of hope. The first phase of this research has been targeted to begin early in 20012 in Haiti (Hope for Haiti). Another project that I am involved with is to develop hope interventions for the U.S. Department of Defense. Every day we are reminded of the many hope challenges facing military personnel.

1. Research Planned for Winter 2011-2012: Hope for Haiti
In 2012, approximately 400 high school teachers in Haiti will convene for a hope conference in Port-au-Prince. The teachers will receive training in my approach to hope and a manual that I recently developed for a seven-part workshop. The targeted group for this intervention is the youth of Haiti who are facing many obstacles in their quest for mastery, attachment, survival, and spirituality (again, the building blocks of hope). The teachers will then return to their respective high schools to provide these workshops to groups of students. We will measure hope before and after the workshop and analyze the data to make sure the workshops are effective, and if necessary, revise our workshop (manual).

Once we are assured of the effectiveness of this approach, we will seek to implement a similar program for children and teens in other hope-challenged contexts, including at-risk young people in the U.S., South America, and Africa, including children who are medically challenged or bullies and the bullied (our preliminary research indicates that both perpetrators and victims may be dealing with hope shortages). I like to refer to this hope program as a kind of "broad-spectrum" psycho-social-spiritual immunization program. This makes perfect sense if you consider that hope is a potent buffer in the face of adversity and that hopelessness is often a precursor for depression, various forms of addictions, and worst of all, suicide.

2. How you can help
My research team and I are in the process of establishing a nonprofit foundation to finance this research. Funding would cover translations of the manuals, training of teachers or workshop leaders, and data processing and analysis. If you are interested in contributing to this effort, please email me at: tscioli@keene.edu, call my office at (603) 358-2541, or write to me at the follow address:

Dr. Anthony Scioli
Professor of Psychology
Keene State College - University System of New Hampshire
229 Main Street
Keene, NH 03435