DENVER -- Got meaning?

Michael Steger wants to know.

Steger, a Colorado State University psychology professor, studies meaning, how people find it in their lives and whether it matters.

In his "Laboratory for the Study of Meaning and Quality of Life" in a contemporary, hyper-green building on CSU's Fort Collins campus, people come to talk about their lives and undergo tests that Steger and his team of students use to explore and measure meaning.

Among the tools are the "Meaning in Life Questionnaire," which asks people to rate on a scale from 1 to 7 the truthfulness of 10 statements, like "I have discovered a satisfying life purpose," and "I am searching for meaning in my life." (So far, more than 250,000 people have filled it out.)

Steger and his team interview people about meaning and ask them to write down what they think it means in their lives. Participants keep diaries for the lab and take pictures of things that give them meaning.

Other participants are involved in experiments. In one, they perform mind-numbingly dull tasks. Then Steger has them perform the same tasks, only with the caveat that the longer they stick with the drudgery, the more money he will donate to Doctors Without Borders. When the tasks were cloaked in purpose, the students not only worked for longer hours, they found the labor more meaningful.

The academic interest began a decade ago, while Steger was working on his Ph.D. at the University of Minnesota. He was studying people who had been through traumas like sexual abuse or had grown up in households with alcoholics. He labored to figure out how they "rewrite their stories, redraw their maps, to create a world that is different from the one since the event."

And then he began wondering how the rest of us wrestle with meaning, how we draw mental maps, regardless of trauma. Those who find more meaning in life, he said, are more conscious about the maps and better able to draw them, instead of just following them on autopilot.

"I started thinking about the assumptions I had seen written into stone in the small town (in southwestern Minnesota) where I grew up," said Steger, a tall, angular, 41-year-old. "I thought, 'What if everybody thought about the assumptions they made in their lives?' I thought, 'If people lived a little bit more intentionally, we would have a better world to live in.'"

In general, people who find some overarching meaning -- some foundational purpose supporting the things they do and their beliefs -- tend to better withstand the things life throws at them.

The questions in Steger's work come easy. But harvesting the data is tough. It turns out people like the idea of meaningful lives, but they don't like talking about it.

"When I told people to write about what makes their lives meaningful, it made them irritable," he said.

At least one factor has emerged as key: Relationships matter more than anything else.

"Depending on the stages of life, those relationships can be parents or extended family," he said. "People value us, they interest us, help us grow. They carry on a legacy, they give us a sense of our place in time. We can look at our genealogies. We see that relationships pull us out of ourselves."

Steger has focused some of his research on people who are "seekers," who find meaning only through an arduous, long and never-ending quest; and people who find meaning

with much more ease, and stop looking once they find it. The latter group can include deeply religious people and political dogmatists, who see the world through political lenses. The two sometimes overlap.

Both types tend to find more meaning than any other group. The ones who find meaning easily and stick with it tend to be the happiest in life, he said; the "seekers" are "thinky, a little in their heads."

"I'm in that boat," Steger said. "Wondering. Not taking things for granted."

Possession of meaning doesn't necessarily translate well for society. Hitler probably had a clear sense of meaning, Steger said.

The trick is finding meaning that is healthy for individuals and the world at the same time.

Steger's research attracted Yerin Shim to CSU's psychology doctoral program. The native of South Korea studies intersections of meaning and work.

"Meaning in life isn't just about happiness," she said. "It's also about drawing meaning from hardships and suffering. It gives you a way to come out of the darkness."

Shim thinks her work helps people "to realize their best potential, to live fulfilling lives. What are the components of meaningful life and work? Not just working for money but knowing the purpose."

For now, the lab hasn't come up with clear strategies for finding meaning, although Shim said the hope is her research will lead to practical ways for people to invest meaning in their work and lives.

Given his work, it's no surprise Steger has thought about meaning in a personal way, outside of his research.

Steger said he would "like to be of some small benefit to the world around me, and if I can't do that then I at least want to not be a problem."

"There are lots of little things," he said. "Trying to make people laugh. Having quiet moments. And the other two biggies are finding and savoring beauty in the world and always trying to learn more about life."