The Effectiveness of a Spiritual Health-Based Intervention on Happiness, Academic Engagement, and Sense of School Belonging

Abstract

The present study aimed to investigate the effectiveness of a spiritual health-based intervention on happiness, academic engagement, and sense of school belonging among secondary school students in Tehran. This study employed a quasi-experimental design with pre-test, post-test, control group, and follow-up stages. The statistical population included secondary school students in Tehran during the 2025–2026 academic year, from which 60 students were selected through convenience sampling and randomly assigned into experimental and control groups. The experimental group participated in eight 90-minute sessions of a spiritual health-based intervention, while the control group received no intervention. Research instruments included the Oxford Happiness Questionnaire, Fredericks Academic Engagement Scale, and the School Belonging Scale. Data were analyzed using repeated-measures analysis of variance and Bonferroni post-hoc tests in SPSS-27 software. The results of repeated-measures analysis of variance indicated significant effects of time, group, and time-by-group interaction for happiness, academic engagement, and sense of school belonging (P<0.001). Bonferroni post-hoc test results further demonstrated that the experimental group showed significant increases in happiness, academic engagement, and school belonging during post-test and follow-up stages compared to the pre-test stage, whereas no significant changes were observed in the control group. Moreover, the differences between post-test and follow-up stages were not statistically significant, indicating the stability of intervention effects over time. The spiritual health-based intervention significantly improved happiness, academic engagement, and sense of school belonging among students, and the effects remained stable during the follow-up stage. Therefore, spirituality-based programs may serve as effective approaches for promoting students’ psychological well-being and educational adjustment.