The transition into college involves several trials and tribulations, and students' ability to deal with this process may be facilitated by finding a sense of purpose. Having a purpose has been shown to have a variety of benefits for college students, whether it is garnering the perseverance to help withstand the various stressors college students must endure or the potential it has for promoting well-being. This review describes why purpose is an important consideration for higher education researchers by noting its relevance to the college experience and its ability to predict desirable outcomes. This review also addresses the potential for individuals to change their purpose and life goals, and 3 potential pathways (proactive, reactive, and social learning) to pursue a purpose. Finally, this review ends by discussing applications for higher education institutes, including how to help students combat potential mental health issues and increase their likelihood of being a successful student. With college student well-being as a prominent concern, there is a clear need for different facets of the education system at large to better address these issues. An effort to integrate purpose throughout the college experience may provide an effective route for professors and administrators to combat this mental health crisis. What is the significance of this article for the general public?With college students often struggling with anxiety and depression, it is important for university officials and education systems at large to support and enhance student wellbeing. Integrating practices that shape and bolster purposefulness throughout the college experience could aid in bettering student mental health, as well as more effectively prepare individuals for meaningful and thoughtful futures following graduation.

College sense of belonging and well-being constitute critical components of college student adjustment and success. Previous studies have generally measured these outcomes at one (or sometimes two) points in time, which prevents researchers from understanding the ongoing adjustment process as well as the dynamic interplay between college experiences and outcomes. This study provides unique insights by examining week-by-week data that consisted of 12,529 total responses from 882 undergraduates during their first semester of college. Fixed-effects regression analyses were used to examine the extent to which weekly changes in students' experiences and interpersonal relationships predicted corresponding changes in adjustment outcomes. Social connection, relationship satisfaction with college friends, and feeling successful in class were most strongly related to changes in belonging and well-being. Some experiences that are often overlooked in higher education research were also significant predictors; specifically, time spent exercising and relationship satisfaction with parents were associated with more favorable outcomes, whereas extensive social media use was associated with poorer outcomes. Implications for research and practice are discussed. Keywords Sense of belonging • Well-being • College adjustment • Longitudinal researchRecently, the increased challenges with mental health and belonging on college campuses have received national attention and been covered by many mainstream media outlets, including The New York Times (Bruni 2017), National Public Radio (Fulton 2017), Time (Reilly 2018), and NBC News (James 2017). "Public" explanations for this phenomenon range from the ubiquity of smartphones and social media, to psychiatric disorders or substance abuse, to social isolation that persists despite-or potentially even because of-the physical presence of many other students. The discourse on campuses also emphasizes the magnitude of the problem by frequently referring to a mental health "crisis." A recent review of data from campus counseling centers indicated that the numbers of students * Nicholas A. Bowman

Background: Sense of purpose, or the extent to which one perceives their lives to have meaningful goals and directions, may aid in initiating satisfying and stable new connections while positively maintaining old ones for college students. Purpose: The current study sought to evaluate how a college students' sense of purpose during their first week of college may predict their satisfaction with different relationship types throughout their first semester of university. Research Design: At the beginning of the semester, students reported their sense of purpose, and every week of the semester they reported their weekly relationship satisfaction across a variety of domains (i.e., parents, home friends, university friends, roommates, resident assistants, and significant others). Study Sample: The current study followed-up first year college students ( n = 364) from a private Midwestern university who all participated in the same Psychology of Young Adulthood class. Data Analysis: Multilevel models were conducted to evaluate mean-level relationship satisfaction trajectories throughout the first semester and whether sense of purpose predicted those trajectories when accounting for gender and the Big Five personality traits. Results: Friendships with home friends and university friends as well as parental relationships increased in satisfaction during the first semester, while relationships with roommates and resident assistants decreased. Furthermore, a higher sense of purpose was associated with greater relationship satisfaction with university friends and parents, even when accounting for the Big Five personality traits, as well as greater relationship satisfaction stability. Conclusions:  Findings paint a nuanced and equivocal nature of relationships during the first semester, and point to the need to better understand how and when sense of purpose does or does not yield positive relationships over time.

Recent theorizing has implicated affect regulation as central to the experience of homesickness. Conceptualized as grief due to losing social connections with close others when relocating, homesickness is associated with poor emotional and social adjustment. The present study examined how mood regulation and relationship qualityat home and in collegepredict homesickness and negative affect among college students (N = 168). We assessed 16 mood regulation strategies as well as relationship quality each week over the first college term. As predicted, time-lagged multilevel analyses demonstrate that avoidance-oriented strategies were helpful in the short term (the following week), but chronic avoidance (across the college term) predicted higher levels of homesickness. Approach-oriented regulatory strategies did not predict homesickness, however. Relationship quality demonstrated differential main effects at the between-person level but did not predict fluctuations in homesickness from week to week. Across the college term, closer ties at home predicted greater homesickness, whereas closer ties in college predicted lower homesickness. Notably, there were distinct effects of mood regulation for homesickness compared to negative affect. The present study is among the first to examine effects of mood regulation on homesickness longitudinally, suggesting it is important to consider the type of regulation strategies being used as well as the time scale.

No abstract