ArticleQuality of life research : an international journal of quality of life aspects of treatment, care and rehabilitation2020
Assessing meaning & purpose in life: development and validation of an item bank and short forms for the NIH PROMIS
Article in Quality of life research : an international journal of quality of life aspects of treatment, care and rehabilitation, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to trial NCT05227794 (The Yale Equity in Student Well-Being Project), which is not on this map. Cited by 44 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
The Yale Equity in Student Well-Being Project: The Effects of 8-Week Online Compassion Cultivation Training (CCT) and Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) on Diverse University Students' Social Well-Being and Mental Health
Who cites it
44 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 66 citations in OpenAlex.
- Purpose in life and depressive symptoms: An individual-participant meta-analysis of >500,000 participants across six world regions.Journal of affective disorders · 2026Pooled it
- Systematic review of search for meaning in life assessment tools: highlighting the need for a quest for significance scale.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Pooled it
- Purpose in life and stress: An individual-participant meta-analysis of 16 samples.Journal of affective disorders · 2024Pooled it
- Demographics in distress: a national study of burnout and well-being of resident physicians in high-burnout specialties.BMC medical education · 2026Trial
- Trial
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- Links between Cannabinoid Hyperemesis Syndrome symptoms and drug use, mental health problems, antisocial behavior, and personality in a national survey of adults in the United States.medRxiv : the preprint server for health sciences · 2026Article
- Tracking quality of life-related outcomes in the U.S. population with monthly PROMIS computerized adaptive testing.Quality of life research : an international journal of quality of life aspects of treatment, care and rehabilitation · 2026Article
- Telehealth-Delivered Mindfulness-Based Intervention: Protocol for a Randomized Clinical Trial for Individuals With Alcohol Use Disorder.JMIR research protocols · 2026Article
- Self-reported positive health outcomes during the COVID-19 pandemic among adolescents born preterm in the ECHO cohort.Journal of perinatology : official journal of the California Perinatal Association · 2026Article
- Work Hours, Stress, and Burnout Among Resident Physicians.JAMA network open · 2026Article
- Purpose in life and coping strategies: Main associations and moderation by concurrent distress.PloS one · 2026Article
- The Physiology of the WEight-Reduced State (POWERS) study: environmental, psychological, and social determinants of health.International journal of obesity (2005) · 2026Article
- Turning Patients' Open-Ended Narratives of Chronic Pain Into Quantitative Measures: Natural Language Processing Study.JMIR human factors · 2025Article
- "It fostered a greater appreciation for my little corner of the world": A feasibility study of a therapeutic photography intervention for the well-being of autistic youth.Autism : the international journal of research and practice · 2025Article
- A longitudinal mixed methods social network analysis to evaluate a peer-led housing program for older men returning from incarceration: Study protocol & pre-implementation results.Health & justice · 2025Article
- Measuring Whole Person Health: A Scoping Review.Journal of integrative and complementary medicine · 2025Article
- Virtual Life Story Club Intervention to Improve Loneliness and Apathy in Community-Dwelling Older Adults: Protocol for a Mixed Methods Feasibility Study.JMIR research protocols · 2025Article
- Psychometric properties of the Pediatric Evaluation of Disability Inventory - Patient Reported Outcome: A cognitively accessible measure of functional performance.Developmental medicine and child neurology · 2025Article
- Study protocol of a hybrid type 1 effectiveness-implementation multisite trial: Dialectical behavior therapy skills group for Veterans at high-risk for suicide attempt.Contemporary clinical trials · 2025Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
8 authors at 6 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
purposeA sense of meaning and purpose is important for people living with acute and chronic illness. It can buffer the effects of stress and facilitate adaptive coping. As part of the Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System (PROMIS), we developed and validated an item response theory (IRT)-based measure of meaning and purpose in life.
methodsInformed by a literature review and patient and content-expert input, we wrote 52 items to assess meaning and purpose and administered them to a general population sample (n = 1000) along with the Meaning in Life Questionnaire-Presence of Meaning Subscale (MLQ-Presence) and the Life Engagement Test (LET). We split the sample in half for exploratory factor analysis (EFA) followed by confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). IRT analyses included assessments of differential item functioning (DIF).
resultsParticipants had a mean age of 47.8 years and 50.3% were male. EFA revealed one dominant factor and CFA yielded a good fitting model for a 37-item bank (CFI = 0.962, TLI = 0.960, RMSEA = 0.085). All items were free of sex, age, education, and race DIF. Internal consistency reliability estimates ranged from α = 0.90 (4-item short form) to α = 0.98 (37-item bank). The 8-item Meaning and Purpose short form was correlated with the MLQ-Presence (r = 0.89), the LET (r = 0.79), and the full PROMIS Meaning and Purpose item bank (r = 0.98).
conclusionsThe PROMIS Meaning and Purpose measures demonstrated sufficient unidimensionality and displayed good internal consistency, model fit, and convergent validity. Further psychometric testing of the PROMIS Meaning and Purpose item bank and short forms in people with chronic diseases will help evaluate the generalizability of this new tool.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.