Objective To explore the association between behavioral, emotional problems and life events among adolescents, and to determine which factors of life events correlate most highly with the behavioral, emotional problems. Method A total of 1 325 adolescents were investigated with Youth Self-Report (YSR) of Achenbach’s behavior checklist and Adolescent Self-Rating Life Events Checklist (ASLEC), and the data were analyzed with canonical correlation analysis. Results Canonical correlation was statistically significant. The correlation coefficients of the first pair of canonical variables in the male and female group were 0.631 3 and 0.621 1, respectively, and the cumulative proportion of the first two pairs of canonical variables was above 0.95. In the first pair of canonical variables, the loadings of anxious/depressed, interpersonal sensitivity and study pressure were higher, while in the second pair, withdrawal and punishment were the most important factors. Conclusions The effects of life events on emotional problems mainly contributed to interpersonal sensitivity and study pressure.