Examination of the relationship between the negative automatic thoughts of university students and life satisfaction

The aim of this study is to examine the effect of negative automatic thoughts of university students on their life satisfaction according to some demographic variables. The sample of the study consists of 372 students from Gaziantep University, Gaziantep. These students are in the range of preparatory and 4th grade studying from 18 different departments. Personal Information Form, Automatic Thoughts Scale and Adult Life Satisfaction Scale were administered to the students. In analytical statistical evaluations, numerical data between independent groups were compared with Mann-Whithey U test for two groups and Kruskal Wallis Test for more than two groups. Spearman's Correlation Test was used to evaluate the relationship between independent variables. The main problem of this research, "Does the negative automatic thoughts of university students have an effect on their life satisfaction?" According to the findings obtained from the procedures carried out to seek an answer to the question; It was found that there was a strong and inverse statistically significant relationship between the Automatic Thoughts Scale total score and the Life Satisfaction Scale total score and the general life satisfaction sub-dimension. According to this finding, it was revealed that as the automatic thoughts of individuals decrease, their life satisfaction increases, and as their automatic thoughts increase, their life satisfaction decreases.