Multidimensional life satisfaction reports of middle school students with serious emotional disturbance

This study evaluated the potential utility of the Multidimensional Students' Life Satisfaction Scale (MSLSS; Huebner, 1994) with a sample of 49 students in Grades 6 through 8 identified as seriously emotionally disturbed (SED) and a comparison sample of 49 matched non-SED students. The initial internal consistency reliabilities for the MSLSS domains suggested the need to modify the scale for use with middle school SED students. Following scale modifications, reliability estimates for SED students reached acceptable levels for research purposes on five of the six domains. The results also yielded promising, but tentative, support for the validity of the MSLSS when used with SED students. Subsequent comparisons of the mean ratings on the life satisfaction domains revealed that SED students reported lower levels of satisfaction with peer friendships than did their non-SED counterparts. Also, relationships between domain-specific and global life satisfaction judgments differed for the SED students, suggesting that SED students formulate their overall life satisfaction judgments differently than their non-SED peers. Limitations of the current study and implications for future research are discussed.