Are All Purposes Worth Having? Integrating Content and Strength in Purpose Research

Abstract

A prevailing belief is that a sense of purpose in life is worth having, based on evidence that it predicts greater psychological functioning, social relationships, physical health, and longevity. Yet, whether the benefits of having a sense of purpose persist across all contents – or the actual substance of one’s aspirations – lingers as a critical blind spot within this literature. Here, we contend that an ecological systems perspective is needed to contextualize how purpose content either enables or extinguishes the benefits of feeling purposeful. We nominate congruence (the fit between a purpose and ecological conditions) and feasibility (the ease with which a purpose can be pursued) as measurable features of purpose content that fuse people and contexts and potentiate whether a sense of purpose proves favorable. Greater congruence and feasibility should orchestrate support for purpose-related goals, actions, and justifications, thus amplifying the likelihood of positive outcomes. Practical strategies for integrating the congruence and feasibility of individuals’ aspirations within the study of purpose are discussed.

Why youth are more purposeful than we think

“…Each individual and each individual's purpose develop within broader, interwoven sociohistorical systems (Burrow et al, 2021). The macro-level structures in society may both actively hinder purpose development for marginalized youth and cause them to be less readily identified as purposeful.…”

“…However, developmental psychology has long recognized the concerns inherent in classificatory, stage, or status models, which share commonalities with the having strategies in capturing purpose. Adolescence and emerging adulthood are periods ripe for developing purpose (e.g., Burrow et al, 2021;Damon et al, 2003), so some developmental increase in purpose likely occurs between this time and young adulthood. Longitudinal work is needed to capture trends in sense of purpose or sensing-having hybrids during this developmental period.…”

What Makes a Purpose “Worth Having”?

“…In "Are All Purposes Worth Having?" (Burrow et al 2021, this issue, DOI 10.1159/000515176), the authors astutely point out that research on purpose to date has rarely considered whether all purposes are indeed worth pursuing. This is an important question to address.…”

Scientific and Ethical Mandates in the Study of Purpose

“…Because of such benefits, it could be argued that all purposes are worth pursuing. But we would not make that argument, for reasons we offered in our commentary to the original Burrow et al (2021) article. We agree with that article's driving point that the question of whether any particular purpose is "worth having" should indeed be addressed.…”

“…The object of our commentary (Bronk & Damon, 2021, "What makes a purpose 'worth having'?") was a thoughtful Human Development article by Burrow et al (2021) entitled "Are all purposes worth having?" It should be clear from the titles of our commentary and the original article that the question explored by both pieces is how to determine whether a purpose chosen by a young person is worth having.…”