Daily Boredom and Daily Life Satisfaction: A Daily Diary Study of Meaning in Life as a Mediator

ABSTRACT Although prior research has demonstrated that boredom is associated with lower life satisfaction at the between‐person level, the within‐person association between them and its mediating mechanism remains unexplored. Therefore, the present study employed a daily diary design to examine whether daily boredom predicted daily life satisfaction and whether this association was mediated by meaning in life. Over two consecutive weeks, 146 Chinese college students ( M age = 20.75, 44.5% female) completed daily assessments of boredom, meaning in life, and life satisfaction. A multilevel 1‐1‐1 mediation model was used to separate within‐person associations from between‐person differences and to examine the indirect effect of daily boredom on daily life satisfaction through daily meaning in life. At the within‐person level, higher daily boredom was related to lower daily life satisfaction. Moreover, daily meaning in life significantly mediated this within‐person association, such that greater daily boredom predicted lower daily meaning in life, which in turn predicted lower daily life satisfaction. These findings clarify the within‐person psychological process linking daily boredom to life satisfaction and suggest that enhancing meaning in life may help improve the daily life satisfaction of emerging adults experiencing boredom.