Students' life satisfaction in early adolescence: An evaluation in terms of school counseling

Abstract

It is important that children and adolescents are generally content and happy with their lives both for their emotional and social development and for their possession of a ready "positive power", which can make their lives easier in their future years. Life satisfaction which is perceptual dimension of happiness has been defined as a cognitive appraisal of one's own quality of life. Developmentally, early adolescence appears to be a difficult period and life satisfaction as a positive perception of life is important to support the adolescent development in this period. There are many factors that affect student life satisfaction such as family characteristics, peer relationships, school experiences, academic achievement, and students' psychological characteristics in early adolescence. Taking into account these factors, school counseling and guidance services can exhibit a function directly or indirectly to increase the students' life satisfaction.