The Ecology of Purposeful Living Across the Lifespan

Book excerpt: This book explores what it means to live a purposeful life and outlines the benefits associated with purpose across different life domains. It also demonstrates that purpose in life is not reducible to constructs such as happiness, well-being, or identity development. The importance of having a sense of purpose in life is attracting renewed attention in both scientific and social arenas. Mounting evidence from intricately designed experiments and large-scale studies reveals how pursuing a purpose can make a person happier, healthier, and even lengthen their lifespan. However, existing texts on purpose have said little on why having has these effects, how it may influence our ability to navigate diverse environments, or how best to consider the construct from a multidisciplinary approach that moves beyond psychology. Recognizing this gap in the literature, this book provides multidisciplinary perspectives on the topic of purpose, and examines what we can do as researchers, interventionists, and society as a whole to imbue purposefulness in the lives of people across the lifespan. It includes contributions from key figures on topics such as identity, health, youth programs and youth purpose, diversity, aging and work.