You Have the Report — Now What?
You've completed the VIA character strengths assessment and you're looking at the results. The most common mistake parents make at this point is to focus immediately on the Growth Areas — the traits at the bottom of the list. This instinct is understandable but counterproductive. VIA research consistently shows that building on Signature Strengths produces faster, more sustained development than targeting weaknesses directly.
Start with the top. Understand what each Signature Strength means in practice. Find it in your child's everyday behaviour. Only then consider which Growth Area to work on — and focus on one at a time.
The 6 Virtues: What They Mean in Practice
The 24 VIA strengths are organised into 6 virtue clusters. Understanding which virtue a strength belongs to tells you how it shows up in your child's life:
Wisdom
Knowledge-based strengths — how your child acquires and uses information. A child dominant in Wisdom strengths is naturally drawn to learning, asks "why?" constantly, and connects ideas across domains. Curiosity and Love of Learning live here.
Courage
Emotional strengths that help children persist despite difficulty. Perseverance, Bravery, and Zest belong here. A child strong in Courage engages fully, recovers from setbacks quickly, and often takes on challenges that peers avoid.
Humanity
Interpersonal strengths — how your child relates to others one-on-one. Kindness, Love, and Social Intelligence are here. A child dominant in Humanity is deeply empathetic, forms close friendships, and is naturally attuned to others' emotions.
Justice
Civic strengths — how your child operates in groups. Teamwork, Fairness, and Leadership belong here. Strong Justice strengths appear in children who take group dynamics seriously, advocate for peers, and take on organising roles.
Temperance
Protective strengths that regulate excess. Self-Regulation, Prudence, Humility, and Forgiveness live here. These strengths help children manage impulses, think before acting, and recover from interpersonal friction.
Transcendence
Meaning-making strengths that connect children to something larger than themselves. Gratitude, Hope, Humour, and Appreciation of Beauty are here. Strong Transcendence strengths often appear in children who find deep meaning in small things and maintain optimism through difficulty.
How to Act on Signature Strengths
For each of your child's top Signature Strengths, identify one activity or context where they can use it intentionally this week. The goal is not to create extra work — it is to notice existing opportunities and name them.
| Signature Strength | School application | Home activity |
|---|---|---|
| Curiosity | Choose a rabbit-hole topic for a homework project | Ask one "why?" follow-up question after every read-aloud |
| Perseverance | Set a "hard work" goal for one subject this term | Play a board game or puzzle that requires sustained effort |
| Kindness | Identify one classmate who seems left out | Volunteer together for one hour per month |
| Leadership | Nominate for a class role or group task lead | Plan and run a family activity from start to finish |
| Creativity | Propose an alternative approach to a school project | One open-ended project per week — no instructions, no "correct" answer |
| Self-Regulation | Set a pre-homework wind-down routine | Build a screen-time schedule together — child sets the rules |
How to Work on a Growth Area
Growth Areas are not character flaws — they are the traits with the most development runway. The most effective approach:
- 1Choose one: Pick the Growth Area most relevant to your child's current biggest challenge (not the lowest score overall).
- 2Find a micro-behaviour: Identify the smallest possible action that exercises that trait. For self-regulation: a 2-minute calm routine before a frustrating task. For humility: asking "what could I have done better?" after any competitive activity.
- 3Practise daily for 30 days: Character strengths develop through repeated activation, not occasional big efforts. One small habit practised consistently outperforms an intensive weekend focus.
- 4Use Signature Strengths as scaffolding: If your child's top strength is Creativity but their Growth Area is Prudence, introduce prudence through creative planning — designing a project timeline as a creative exercise rather than a chore.
How to Use the Peer Benchmarking
The peer percentile in your report shows how your child's score for each trait compares to other children the same age who have taken the assessment. A few principles for interpreting it:
- 50th percentile is average — not a problem. Half of all children score below this, half above.
- Below 30th percentile in a Growth Area is worth a targeted activity, not concern.
- Above 80th percentile in a Signature Strength confirms a genuinely prominent trait — lean into it.
- Avoid comparing siblings using percentiles — different children, different profiles, different development paths.
Peer benchmarking is most useful for calibrating parental expectations. A child at the 35th percentile for self-regulation is not abnormal — it's a development target with a realistic improvement path.
Common Mistakes When Reading the Report
- ✗Focusing only on Growth Areas: Strengths-first development consistently outperforms deficit-focused approaches in VIA research. Lead with what your child does well.
- ✗Treating the results as fixed: Character strengths are not personality types. They respond to environment and deliberate practice. A low score today is a development opportunity, not a permanent label.
- ✗Trying to fix everything at once: One Growth Area, one habit, 30 days. Scattered effort across multiple traits produces no measurable change.
- ✗Not involving the child (for ages 10+): Children who understand their own Signature Strengths are significantly more likely to use them intentionally. Frame the conversation around what they're already good at.
- ✗Not retaking after 6–12 months: Without a follow-up assessment, you have no way to measure whether development activities are producing results. The comparison between two reports is the most motivating data point in the process.
Haven't Taken the Assessment Yet?
The free VIA-backed personality assessment takes under 5 minutes, covers ages 6–20, and requires no account. You can also read our complete guide to child personality assessments for an overview of the 24 VIA character strengths, the 6 virtues, and how the assessment is structured by age tier.