The Relationship between Basic Psychological Needs Gratification and Psychological Well-Being in Female Students: The Mediating Role of Self-Efficacy

Considering the importance of students’ well-being and the study of variables affecting it, the present study aimed to investigate the mediating effect of self-efficacy on the relationship between basic psychological needs gratification and students’ psychological well-being.

The method of this research was descriptive-correlational. The statistical population of the study included all female junior high school students in the second district of Hamedan in the academic year 2019-2020 (N = 1200). The statistical sample of this study was selected using Two-stage cluster random sampling method with 302. For data collection, Basic Needs Gratification (Haftlang et.al, 2015), Psychological Well-being (Ryff & Keyes, 1989) and General Self-efficacy (Sherer and Maddux, 1982) questionnaires were used. The collected data were also analyzed using AMOS structural equations.

The results of data analysis showed that the gratification of basic psychological needs and self-efficacy explain 63% of the variance of psychological well-being. Gratification of basic psychological needs explains 39% of the variance in self-efficacy. In addition, self-efficacy has a positive and significant effect on adolescent psychological well-being (p <0.001) and self-efficacy in the relationship between basic needs and psychological well-being of adolescents has a positive mediating role. And has significance (p <0.001).

Based on the findings of this study, it can be concluded that the psychological well-being model of adolescents has a good fit based on the gratification of basic psychological needswith self-efficacy mediation. The results of this study also showed that self-efficacy has an important role in satisfying the basic psychological needs and psychological well-being of students; therefore, satisfying the basic needs of students leads to increasing their self-efficacy and ultimately can be very effective in increasing the psychological well-being of students.