[Association of the meaning of life with satisfaction, the occurrence of subjective complaints and the family's economic status in the population of lower secondary school students].

INTRODUCTION

Feeling of meaning in life is extremely crucial factor of mental health. The lack of it can result in various disorders. Many authors, especially those connected with current of humanistic psychology underline the teenagers’ life sense.

THE AIM

The aim of the paper was to examine the level of satisfaction with life, the frequency of psychosomatic complaints by junior high school students as well as the estimation of economical status of family and the analysis of meaning in life with above mentioned factors.

MATERIAL AND METHODS

The research was carried out in 2015 at 70 schools from all over the country, in group of 3695 lower secondary school students of I-III classes at the age of 13-17 (M=14,9; SD=0,87). The analysis connected with meaning in life using the shorten version of Purpose in Life Test (PIL) as well as analysis of life satisfaction using Cantril scale were taken up. What is more, the subjective physical complaints using single-factor shorten scale and economic status of family with the usage of material resources FAS scale (Family Affluence Scale) were examined. The statistical analysis included a one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA), t-student test post-hoc test as well as multivariate logistic regression model.

RESULTS

The average level of meaning in life among the examined students was 24,7 points (the summary scale 0-36 points), the boys achieved higher score than girls. The students satisfied with life (t=28,0; p<0,001), with rare physical complaints (F=124,8; p<0,001) and from affluent families (F=15,4; p<0,001) were significantly characterized by higher average level of meaning in life than students who were dissatisfied with their life, often or fairly suffer from health complaints and live in families of at most average level of affluence.

CONCLUSION

The meaning in life is positively connected with satisfaction with life, lack of subjective complaints and family affluence. Because there is a lack of analysis linked with school teenagers’ meaning in life in Polish literature, another research involved not only shorten but also full version of this tool should be conducted.