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Flourishing and psychological distress in adults with self-critical perfectionism: The moderating role of self-compassion

Closes 31 December 2026

Are You Your Own Harshest Critic?

We're looking for Australian adults to take part in a study on perfectionism, self-compassion, and wellbeing.

Self-compassion involves responding to personal difficulties, mistakes and feelings of inadequacy with kindness, understanding and a balanced perspective rather than harsh self-criticism.

The study contains 61 survey items, including demographic questions, as well as brief eligibility and consent questions.

Understanding whether self-compassion changes how self-critical perfectionism is associated with flourishing and psychological distress may help clarify how people can experience positive mental health despite being highly self-critical. 

The findings may also inform future wellbeing and psychological support approaches.

This research is being run by Neelam Hussein, a Bachelor of Psychological Science (Honours) student at ACAP University College, supervised by Dr Daniel du Plooy. We're exploring how self-critical perfectionism, self-compassion, flourishing, and psychological distress relate in Australian adults.

Who can participate?
You can take part if you:
✓ are 18 or older
✓ live in Australia
✓ can read and understand English well enough, by self-assessment, to complete the survey in English
✓don't personally know either researcher

What's involved?
An anonymous online survey (about 20–30 minutes) with some questionnaires and a few demographic questions.

Questions?
Contact Neelam ([email protected]) or Dr Daniel du Plooy ([email protected]).

Start the survey