Psychological Consulting Center, Saint George, Romania.
Int J Psychol. 2013;48(3):308-15. doi: 10.1080/00207594.2011.645483. Epub 2012 Mar 1.
Understanding how adolescents achieve meaning in life has important implications for their psychological development. A social cognitive model of meaning development was tested by assessing psychological (self-efficacy, self-regulation and social comparison) and parental (parental responsiveness, demandingness, and social support) variables in a sample of 1944 adolescents (aged 15-19 years; 47.8% males) from secondary schools of the Middle Transylvanian Region, Romania. Both psychological and parental factors were significantly related to meaning in life. For both boys and girls, self-efficacy, self-regulation, and maternal responsiveness related positively with meaning in life, and paternal demandingness related inversely to meaning in life. However, social comparison related positively to meaning only among boys, and paternal responsiveness related positively to meaning only among girls. Results point to a possible meaning-supporting role played by social cognitive variables, as well as parental autonomy support. The gender differences observed here suggest that existing theories of meaning development may need to be elaborated to include family of origin and gender.
理解青少年如何获得生活意义对他们的心理发展具有重要意义。通过评估来自罗马尼亚中 Transylvania 地区中学的 1944 名青少年（年龄在 15-19 岁之间；男性占 47.8%）的心理（自我效能感、自我调节和社会比较）和父母（父母反应能力、要求和社会支持）变量，对意义发展的社会认知模型进行了检验。心理和父母因素与生活意义都显著相关。对于男孩和女孩来说，自我效能感、自我调节和母亲的反应能力与生活意义呈正相关，而父亲的要求与生活意义呈负相关。然而，社会比较仅与男孩的生活意义呈正相关，而父亲的反应能力仅与女孩的生活意义呈正相关。研究结果表明，社会认知变量以及父母的自主支持可能起到了支持生活意义的作用。这里观察到的性别差异表明，现有的意义发展理论可能需要进一步阐述，以包括原生家庭和性别。
