The Relationship between Purpose in Life, Coping Styles and Mental Health among University Students

All humans are searching ways to promote mental health. Mental health is vital for having a healthy life. Some believe that mental health means lack of mental disorders. Positive psychology emphasizes on issues such as hope، wisdom، creativity، spirituality، thinking about future and having purpose in life instead of psychopathology aspects. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between having purpose in life and mental health among university students.

Based on classified sampling from the target population of Ilam University، Iran، 520 students (boys and girls) were randomly selected. Instruments used in this study were Coping Strategies Questionnaire، purpose in life test (PIL) and Goldberg’s General Health Questionnaire. The reliability of these instruments was acceptable in different studies. Pearson correlation coefficient، one way analysis of variance، Turkey test and t-test were used for data analysis.

There was a negative significant relationship between emotion oriented coping style and mental health. Moreover، there was a positive significant relationship between task oriented coping style and purpose of life with mental health. The analysis of variance showed that there were significant difference among purpose of life in different courses، mental health in different courses، emotion and task oriented coping styles in different courses. There was no significant difference between boys and girls regarding purpose of life. But there was a significant difference between them using task oriented coping style. Boys make use of task oriented coping style.

The study showed that there was a significant relationship between purpose of life and mental health. Thus having purpose in life has an important role in preventing mental disorders. Task oriented coping strategy has an important role in maintaining mental health، therefore these strategies can be taught to create a healthy lifestyle and promoted satisfaction.