Introduction:

Positive development is a stage of psychosocial adjustment that accentuates the potentials and resources of young people and their close contexts. The first positive development model for emerging adulthood was developed in Australia, which includes five components: social; life satisfaction; trust and tolerance of others; trust in the authorities and institutions; and action and civic engagement. However, this model has not been investigated in Chile.

Objective:

To analyze the evidence available in the scientific literature on the five components of the positive development model in emerging adults universities.

Materials and methods:

A narrative review of the literature published between 2013 and 2023 in the Web of Science, Scopus, SciELO, Redalyc, and Dialnet databases was conducted.

Results:

83 articles were selected, of which 53 met the inclusion criteria; most of them were qualitative studies (81.13%) and in Spanish (75.47%). There is an evident disparity in terms of the number of studies and topics, e.g., there is more research on life satisfaction and civic action and commitment.

Conclusions:

There are gaps in the Chilean scientific literature in the study of positive development. In addition, idiosyncratic particularities and challenges associated with the stages of emerging adulthood are discussed.

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