No place called home: Life quality and purpose of homeless youths

Subjective quality of life (SQOL) has bee,been reported to display remarkab le resilience to objective circumstances. This is thought to derive from th e capacity to interpret experience in positive ways, but is defeated by ver y adverse circumstances, This raises the question of whether such positive mental devices are able to adequately protect the SQOL of homeless youths, who typically face substantial objective trials. This study compares youths who are homeless or at risk of homelessness with youths living consistentl y with their families (control group). it was found that both the homeless and "at risk" youths reported significantly lower SQOL. These youths also r eported lower levels of personal meaning than the control group, and higher existential vacuum, Of the variables measured, personal meaning provided t he strongest prediction of SQOL, challenging theories that would predict ch oice/responsibleness to provide the predominant contribution. Lack of diffe rences in response between homeless and "at risk " youths suggests that sub jective difficulties may precede homelessness rather than stem from it. A m odel is proposed to describe the possible factors involved,ed in the mainte nance and erosion of SQOL.