Social science research

Patrick van Kessel is a graduate student at the University of Chicago studying:

  • Humanistic psychology
  • Social science research methods
  • Comparative human development
  • Survey design

He is currently conducting research aimed at exploring how various aspects of life contribute to a sense of meaningfulness and purpose. Using a rigorous mixed-methods approach involving in-depth interviews, ethnography, and content analysis, he plans to ultimately design a quantitative survey instrument capable of taxonomizing the different ways in which individuals engage with the concept of meaning in their lives.

Recent photo, June 2011

I like living. I have sometimes been wildly, despairingly, acutely miserable, racked with sorrow, but through it all
I still know quite certainly that just to be alive is a grand thing. – Agatha Christie