The relationship between meaning in life and mental well-being

A number of recent studies reported in the literature lent impetus to the r esearch conducted for the current study. The hypothesis addressed is that m eaning in life:is positively associated with mental well-being irrespective of the nature or topos of the psychopathology. This: hypothesis stems from an existential perspective on psychopathology (and consequently psychother apy) which holds that a sense of meaning in life is a vital element in prov iding coherence to an individual's worldview and hence to his/her mental we ll-being. Interestingly, such an hypothesis also serves to challenge,: with in the existential approach,:;the view of one of the earliest existential p sychologists, namely. Victor Frankl that absence of meaning in life is asso ciated only with a specific form of psychopathology which he termed noogeni c neurosis. Correlational analyses on data, yielded from a random sample (N = 92) of South African university students at one campus, corroborated tha t meaning in life is associated with a wide spectrum Of conventional catego ries of psychopathology as measured by the MMPI as well as with general neu rosis measured by the revised Eysenck Personality Questionnaire - statistic ally significant correlations were established.