Student Functioning,Concerns, and Socio-Personal Well-Being

The following study used the Student Quality of Lifeand Satisfaction (SQOLAS) instrument and 467University of Rhode Island undergraduate and graduatestudents as participants in order to examinerelationships among functioning and performancevariables, student concern and importance areas, andmeasures of socio-personal satisfaction andwell-being. Canonical correlational analysis revealedtwo statistically significant canonical correlationsbetween a student functioning/performance variable setand a concern/importance area variable set. A set ofvariables related to increased concern and importanceratings of socio-sexual behavior, and decreasedratings of crime, violence, multicultural, and genderissues was significantly associated with a second setof variables: increased levels of alcohol use andassociated negative consequences, younger age,increased mental health concerns, men more than women,decreased class year, and less positive ratings towarddirection in life. Standard multiple regressionanalysis produced a statistically significant modelwhere positive attitude towards direction in life canbe predicted by higher levels of socio-personalsatisfaction and deep metacognitive processing, andlower levels of alcohol use and associated negativeconsequences, and fewer mental health concerns.Implications of the results are discussed in relationto theories of cognitive behavior, phenomenologicalfunctioning, life meaning, and well-being.