The DOI matches its Crossref record.
Experiences of meaning in life: A combined qualitative and quantitative approach
Abstract
The present study investigates the relation of aspects of meaning in life with indices of psychological well‐being by means of a combined qualitative and quantitative design. Content analysis of subjects' answers to open questions about personal experiences with meaning in life showed findings that are in line with phenomena that are reported in the literature. Meaningfulness was found to be strongly associated with contact with self, others and the world, whereas meaninglessness was associated with a state of alienation from self, others and the world. The Life Regard Index (LRI), an instrument designed to measure the construct of positive life regard, was found to be strongly associated with the interpersonal dimension of well‐being. The exchange of both positive and negative feelings was associated with positive life regard. As predicted, effective coping with stressful life events in the past was associated with a current sense of meaningfulness as measured with the LRI. The findings support the clinical significance of the construct of meaning in life and add to the validity of the LRI. The strength and weakness of a combined qualitative and quantitative research approach are discussed.
Overview
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Self-check
Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.
The self-check needs the paper’s full text.
Citations
Cited by
The three meanings of meaning in life: Distinguishing coherence, purpose, and significance
Martela, F., & Steger, M. F. (2016) · The Journal of Positive Psychology · doi:10.1080/17439760.2015.1137623 · Cited by 1,401
The Development of Purpose During Adolescence
Damon, W., Menon, J., & Cotton Bronk, K. (2003) · Applied Developmental Science · doi:10.1207/s1532480xads0703_2 · Cited by 1,216
INTERPERSONAL SENSEMAKING AND THE MEANING OF WORK
Wrzesniewski, A., Dutton, J. E., & Debebe, G. (2003) · Research in Organizational Behavior · doi:10.1016/s0191-3085(03)25003-6 · Cited by 833
The Science of Meaning in Life
King, L. A., & Hicks, J. A. (2021) · Annual Review of Psychology · doi:10.1146/annurev-psych-072420-122921 · Cited by 503
The past makes the present meaningful: Nostalgia as an existential resource
Routledge, C., Arndt, J., Wildschut, T., Sedikides, C., Hart, C. M., Juhl, J., Vingerhoets, A. J. J. M., & Schlotz, W. (2011) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/a0024292 · Cited by 463
Metadata
- Authors
- Debats, D. L., Drost, J., & Hansen, P.
- Venue
- British Journal of Psychology
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 1995-08
- Volume
- 86
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 359-375
- ISSN
- 0007-1269 (ISSN-L)
- 2044-8295
- OpenAlex
- W2102635579
- Cited by
- 227
- References
- 0
- FWCI
- 1.39
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
How to cite
Cite CoChat for the checks on this page, and the paper for its own findings.
- This page
- CoChat. (2026). Citation check: Experiences of meaning in life: A combined qualitative and quantitative approach. https://app.cochat.ai/papers/10.1111/j.2044-8295.1995.tb02758.x
- The paper
- Debats, D. L., Drost, J., & Hansen, P. (1995). Experiences of meaning in life: A combined qualitative and quantitative approach. British Journal of Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2044-8295.1995.tb02758.x
Data sources
Bibliographic data: Semantic Scholar, OpenAlex, Crossref.
Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
Semantic Scholar’s data is described in: Kinney, R., et al. (2023). The Semantic Scholar Open Data Platform. arXiv:2301.10140.
