The purpose of the presented study was to recognise mutual relations between students’ self-education activity and their sense of the meaning of life. The answer to the question: What is the sense of the meaning of life among students of high, average and low levels of self-education activity? was sought. In the study, the estimation method was used. Students’ level of self-education activity was measured on the basis of the Self-education Activity Scale (SAS), created by the author, whereas in order to define the level of the sense of the meaning of life, J.C.Crumbagh and L.T.Macholicka’s Meaning of Life Sense Scale, adapted to the Polish reality by Z. Płużek, was used. Analysis showed a relationship between the above-mentioned variables, in particular in terms of one’s sense of life and assessment of its value. As for the other components of the sense of the meaning of life level: self-esteem and approach towards death and suicide, no significant dependencies were observed.

The article comprises a static scientific-analytical review of the values and life meanings of Ukrainian youth in the conditions of war. The instability of the situation is characterized by the life circumstances that continue for a long time and significantly go beyond the social and natural norms in which people are used to living. In this social context, the value paradigm of a person is changing. On the basis of statistical data, a quantitative and qualitative analysis of the problems that concern Ukrainian youth today was carried out, the types of their social activity, life priorities and meanings, dominant factors that influence the process of personality formation were determined. It is also stated in the study that the formation of the young people’s value foundations during the war is influenced by their emotional and psychological state, which in most cases is not stable and has a contradictory and changeable character. Extremeness and categoricalness in assessments, frequent changes in emotional moods and priorities in young people are a result of the experienced stress. Some important generalizations are made regarding the restructuring of the value sphere of young people under the influence of such a tragic socio-political phenomenon as war.