Examining the Relationships among Religiosity, Hopelessness and Life Satisfaction in Male Sports Participating and Non-Sports Students

Abstract

Aim of the Study: The present study was carried out to compare life satisfaction, hopelessness, and religiosity among sports participating and non-sports university students and to examine how these variables were related within each group.

Methodology: Data was collected from 397 students among them 196 (M _age = 20.79, SD = 1.787) were male sports participating students and 201 (M _age = 21.25, SD = 1.915) were non-sports students. The nature of this research was quantitative cross-sectional. For life satisfaction a tool named Satisfaction with Life Scale (Diener et al., 1985), for hopelessness a tool named Hopelessness Inventory-5 Scale (Wang et al., 2023) and for religiosity a tool named Religiosity of Islam Scale (Jana-Masri & Priester, 2007) were utilized. Appropriate statistical tests were run to analyze the data.

Results: The findings showed that students who regularly participated in sports reported greater life satisfaction and lower hopelessness than their non-sports counterparts. However, no difference was observed in religiosity between the two groups. Correlation analysis further showed that hopelessness was negatively related to life satisfaction in both groups. Among sports participating students, religiosity was associated with lower hopelessness but was not related to life satisfaction. In contrast, religiosity among non-sports students was linked with both higher life satisfaction and lower hopelessness.

Conclusion: These findings provide a better understanding of the psychological well-being of university students and may help educational institutions and sports professionals design programs that promote both mental health and positive lifestyle behavior.