WELL-BEING IN EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATION: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW OF THEORETICAL FOUNDATIONS, APPLIED RESEARCH, AND IMPLICATIONS FOR THE VIETNAMESE CONTEXT
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.18173/2354-1075.2026-0027Keywords:
Child Well-being, Early Childhood Education (ECE), Holistic Development, Positive Education, Social-Emotional Learning (SEL), Mental Health, Preschool Education, VietnamAbstract
The cultivation of well-being in early childhood is increasingly recognized as an indispensable component of holistic development, forming the bedrock for lifelong learning, mental health, and social competence. Moving beyond simplistic notions of happiness, contemporary scholarship defines well-being as a robust, multidimensional construct encompassing emotional, social, cognitive, and physical health, representing an optimal state of functioning that draws from both hedonic and eudaimonic traditions. To synthesize the evidence on this topic, this paper provides a comprehensive systematic review of the theoretical foundations, empirical evidence, and practical applications of well-being education in Early Childhood Education (ECE). Guided by PRISMA principles, a systematic search of international (Scopus, PsycINFO, etc.) and Vietnamese (VNU-LIC) databases for literature from the last 15 years yielded 86 publications for thematic analysis. Our synthesis reveals that child well-being is determined by a dynamic interplay of factors across the child’s ecological systems; that a strong evidence base supports intervention modalities like Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) and play-based pedagogy, grounded in frameworks such as Attachment Theory and Positive Psychology; and that effective application necessitates a holistic model integrating the environment, curriculum, educators’ role, and partnerships. A central contribution of this review is its analysis of the specific challenges and strategic opportunities for implementing well-being education within the Vietnamese ECE system, identifying critical gaps in policy-practice alignment, teacher capacity, and culturally-adapted resources. Ultimately, our findings provide a clear mandate that prioritizing early childhood well-being is not merely a pedagogical trend but a fundamental and strategic investment in human capital, yielding long-term benefits for individual resilience, academic success, and the sustainable development of society.
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