The experience of enjoyment and its contribution to personal fulfillment in young students

Abstract

Enjoyment through activities has an important impact on the positive development of young people. The general objective of this work is to know the characteristics of enjoyment in young students and its relationship with the sense of personal fulfillment. Method. 839 high school and university students participated (63.9% female) between the ages of 13 and 30 (M = 18.40; SD = 4.82) from Buenos Aires Metropolitan Area (AMBA)/Argentina. Instruments: Scale of Enjoyment in Activity (EDA), Scale of Personal Fulfillment (ESAR) and a sociodemographic questionnaire. Data analysis: An exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was carried out, the reliability of the factors was studied, t tests and ANOVAs for the differences between groups, Pearson's correlation and simple linear regression were performed. Results: The EFA yielded two factors that explain 66.6% of the variance. Enjoyment can be known through two subscales: positive affect and involvement. The activities they enjoy the most are physical-sports, artistic and social. Men show more involvement than women and secondary students show more involvement than young people at the university level. Enjoyment predicts a sense of personal fulfillment. Future studies will make it possible to know the ability of enjoyment to predict health and well-being parameters in the young population.