Meaning-Making Profiles During Emerging Adulthood: A Person-Oriented Approach in the Context of Romantic and Working Conditions

Abstract

Empirical evidence supported the existence of different meaning-making profiles among youths, however, it is unknown whether these profiles are related to specific transitional conditions. The present study applied a multi-group Latent Profile Analysis to examine the generalizability and criterion-validity of meaning-making profiles across two samples of emerging and young adults living different contextual situations (pre-COVID-19 vs during COVID-19), and to investigate their association with the balanced versus imbalanced conditions in the romantic and work role transitions. Three meaning-making profiles, searchers (high search, average presence of meaning), in-between (low search, average presence), and fulfilled (very low search, high presence) were supported by strong generalizability and criterion-validity evidence (i.e. fulfilled individuals showed higher well-being). As expected, older individuals were more likely to be fulfilled, while gender wasn’t a predictor of profiles. Imbalanced individuals in love and work were more likely to be searchers, while fulfilled individuals were predominantly living a balanced condition.

Social Withdrawal, Solitude, and Existential Concerns in Emerging Adulthood

“…Unsociability was positively related to presence of meaning and search for meaning and negatively related to emptiness and meaninglessness. These findings are consistent with existing research on existential well-being, which indicates that search for meaning is related to positive well-being in people with high presence of meaning (e.g., Cohen & Cairns, 2012; Krok, 2018; Zambelli & Tagliabue, 2022). Similarly, these findings add to the existing literature on social withdrawal, which shows that unsociability is a rather benign form of withdrawal as it has been found to be related to fewer internalizing and relationship problems (Barry et al, 2013; Bowker et al, 2017; Braathu et al, 2022; Closson et al, 2019; Nelson, 2013).…”

“…More positive associations with well-being and mental health have been found for presence of meaning than for search for meaning (e.g., Dezutter et al, 2014; Martela & Steger, 2016; Steger et al, 2008), but the interaction is complex. For example, when young people actively search for meaning, they experience life satisfaction and other positive outcomes if they already have achieved some presence of meaning as well (Krok, 2018; Shin & Steger, 2016; Steger et al, 2006; Zambelli & Tagliabue, 2022). Conversely, when searching is high but presence of meaning is low, then life satisfaction decreases (Cohen & Cairns, 2012).…”