Psychometric properties of the Turkish version of the Aspiration Index and the relationship between aspirations and subjective well-being

Abstract

The 35-item Aspiration Index (Kasser and Ryan, 1996) comprises seven life goals and is a widely used tool for measuring how much individuals care about each life goal and for deriving a relative intrinsic/extrinsic goal orientation score. This research tested the psychometric properties of the Turkish version of the Aspiration Index and investigated the relationships between life goals and subjective well-being. The results of the exploratory factor analysis revealed a seven-factor solution, as expected, and the factors exhibited good reliability. A follow-up confirmatory factor analysis supported the seven-factor structure by showing that the data fit the model well and that the index demonstrated good structural validity. The present research also found that the only life goal with significant correlations to subjective well-being was the community contributions goal. Moreover, age was positively correlated with subjective well-being, and women were more intrinsically oriented and more satisfied with their lives than men.