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Personal Sense of Meaning and Purpose Survey

Explores where people currently find meaning, how they prioritize competing life domains, and how well daily life matches what they say matters most — with an AI follow-up that digs into the story behind their strongest and weakest sources of purpose. Useful for researchers, coaches, or wellbeing programs studying purpose and life satisfaction.

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Sample questions

A preview of what’s in the template. Every question is editable before you launch.

13 questions · ~7 min
Q01
Message

Thanks for taking a few minutes to reflect on something big: what gives your life meaning. There are no right answers here — honest, in-the-moment thoughts are most useful. About 5-6 minutes.

Q02
Opinion ScaleRequired

Right now, how strong is your overall sense that your life has meaning and purpose?

Scale: 0 – 10
Min:No sense of purposeMax:Very strong sense of purpose
Q03
Multiple ChoiceRequired

Which of these best describes the biggest source of meaning in your life right now?

  • Relationships (family, partner, friends)
  • Work or career achievement
  • Personal growth or learning
  • Spirituality or faith
  • Creativity or self-expression
  • Community or helping others
  • Health and personal wellbeing
Q04
Multiple ChoiceRequired

In the last month, how often did you actively stop and think about what gives your life meaning?

  • Never
  • Rarely (once or twice)
  • Sometimes (a few times)
  • Often (weekly)
  • Daily or almost daily
Q05
RankingRequired

Rank these areas of life by how much they contribute to your sense of meaning, from most to least.

  1. Family and close relationships
  2. Career or achievement
  3. Personal growth and learning
  4. Spirituality or faith
  5. Health and wellbeing
  6. Community and contribution
  7. Leisure and creativity
Drag to rank
Q06
Point AllocationRequired

Thinking about a typical week, how do you actually split your time and energy across these areas? Distribute 100 points to reflect reality, not your ideal.

  • Family and relationships
  • Career and achievement
  • Personal growth and learning
  • Health and wellbeing
  • Spirituality or faith
  • Community and contribution
  • Leisure and creativity
Allocate 100 points
Q07
MatrixRequired

How much do you agree with each statement about your life as it is today?

5 rows × 5 columns
  • I have a clear sense of what I want my life to stand for
  • I feel I contribute to something bigger than myself
  • My daily activities line up with what actually matters to me
  • I have relationships that make my life feel worthwhile
  • I look forward to the future with a sense of purpose
Columns: Strongly disagree · Disagree · Neutral · Agree · Strongly agree
Q08
Best–Worst Trade-off (MaxDiff)Required

From this list of values, which matters most and which matters least to your personal sense of meaning?

  • Family
  • Career success
  • Freedom and autonomy
  • Spiritual connection
  • Adventure and new experiences
  • Security and stability
  • Creativity and self-expression
  • Contributing to others
Pick best & worst per setBest:Matters mostWorst:Matters least
Q09
AI Interview

Anchor on the respondent's stated biggest source of meaning and their agreement ratings on the statement battery. Ask them to describe a specific recent moment when that source of meaning felt most real or alive, and, separately, a moment when life felt hollow or off-track. If they ranked a domain low but said they wished it mattered more, probe what's stopping them from investing there. If their answers seem contradictory (e.g., high overall purpose score but low agreement that daily activities align with what matters), gently surface that tension and ask them to reconcile it.

Q10
Short Text

In one sentence, what do you feel you're here to do?

Q11
Multiple Choice

Which best describes your current life stage? (optional)

  • Student
  • Early career
  • Mid career
  • Parent of young children
  • Established career / empty nest
  • Retired
  • Prefer not to say
Q12
Multiple Choice

What is your age range? (optional)

  • Under 25
  • 25-34
  • 35-44
  • 45-54
  • 55-64
  • 65 or older
  • Prefer not to say
Q13
Message

Thank you for sitting with these questions — that takes real reflection. Your responses will be combined anonymously with others to understand how people find and sustain a sense of meaning.

What’s included

  • AI follow-ups

    Adaptive probes on open-ended answers that pull out detail a static form would miss.

  • Attention checks

    Built-in safeguards against rushed answers and low-quality respondents.

  • AI-drafted copy

    Wording, ordering, and branching written by the AI — tuned to your research goal.

  • Auto report

    Themes, quotes, and a plain-English summary write themselves once responses come in.

How it compares

We reviewed the closest templates from other survey tools. Here’s what they do well — and where this template goes further.

Why this template

  • Combines structured measurement (opinion scale, ranking, constant sum, max diff, matrix) with an adaptive AI follow-up interview that digs into the story behind each respondent's strongest and weakest sources of purpose
  • Captures both stated priorities and actual behavior by asking respondents to split real weekly time and energy across life domains, then compares that to what they say matters most
  • Uses a short open-ended 'sense of purpose' statement plus a values max-diff to surface personal language and priorities, which the AI follow-up can probe directly rather than leaving unexamined
  • Opens and closes with human-toned chat messages that frame the reflection and thank respondents, and offers automated scoring and reporting on top of the raw responses

QuestionPro

The Meaning of Life Survey Template

This is a static survey template covering meaning-of-life themes, useful as a starting point for researchers who want to build their own instrument. It appears to be a fixed question set rather than one that adapts based on individual answers. As with most QuestionPro templates, it's meant to be customized within their broader survey platform rather than fielded as-is with follow-up probing built in.

What it does well

  • Directly addresses the meaning-of-life topic, so it's conceptually on-target for purpose research
  • Backed by an established, general-purpose survey platform with broad question-type support
  • Likely easy to duplicate and edit for researchers already using QuestionPro

Where it falls short

  • No adaptive AI follow-up questioning — every respondent gets the same static question set regardless of their answers
  • No indication of guided tasks, screen-share elements, or per-response quality scoring
  • No published methodology or prompt transparency for how questions were derived or how deeper answers would be probed

Ready to launch?

Open this template in the editor. Every part is yours to change before the first respondent sees it.

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