Perfectionism and Well-being in Graduate, Undergraduate and Ph.D. Students: Adaptive versus Maladaptive

Abstract

The prevalence of perfectionism among university students has been reported particularly high, and new theories have been presented to explain its impacts. This study was conducted to evaluate the effect of adaptive and maladaptive perfectionism on psychological well-being in undergraduate and graduate university students. 668 university students (386 undergraduate and 282 graduate students) who studied at Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz and Shiraz University participated voluntarily in this study. They completed the Revised Almost Perfect Scale (APS-R) questionnaire and Ryff's Well-Being Scale. The results showed that the mean scores of adaptive perfectionist students in the psychological well-being and its sub-scales, autonomy, purpose in life, positive relations with others, and environmental mastery, were higher than the group of students with maladaptive perfectionist and non-perfectionist. The statistically significant difference was found (P <0.01). As a result, it can be said that adaptive perfectionist is accompanied by better and higher performance and consequently leads to a higher psychological well-being.