MEANING OF LIFE FOR MEXICAN UNIVERSITYSTUDENTS WITH A HIGH ACADEMIC PERFORMANCEIN A PRIVATE UNIVERSITY

摘要

The XXI Century International Commission of Education, created by the UNESCOin 1998 has estimated that education is going to solve future problems, supported on fourbackbones: learning to know, learning to make, learning to live with others and learningto be. The last one, "learning to be" invites us to think about the influence we have, bothparents and teachers, on children and young's' personal maturity and identity whichallow them to make their life worth living for. From this point of view, and considering the study carried out by Magana and others(2004), we established the following researching goals: 1) To evaluate the "meaning oflife" for Mexican students who are granted by any kind of academic scholarship at theInstituto Tecnologico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey; 2) to explore the resultsrelated to personal, academic, professional and familial variables; 3) to compareresearching results of the previous study made in Mexico, and 4) to analyze thepsychometrical characteristics of the instrument used. The study was carried out inMonterrey, Mexico, in 2005. From a total of 4582 financially aid students, it wasobtained a 1515 students sample (31%), between 16 and 27 years old, belonging to 34different careers. Crumbaugh and Maholick "Purpose in Live" test was applied. It was found that 78.9% of the students show a good meaning of life; a 13.4% islocated in an indefinite state; and a 7.7% show a lack of meaning.