Attachment and affective resolution following a stressful event: General and religious coping as possible mediators

Abstract

The current study replicated and extended previous research on mediators of attachment qualities and outcome (affective resolution), including appraisal, coping, and religious coping. Structural equation models were used to analyze the responses on an Internet survey for a primarily Christian sample of 1,289 adults (416 men and 873 women). As expected, appraisal was a significant mediator of ambivalent attachment qualities and coping, as well as ambivalent attachment qualities and religious coping. Avoidance coping significantly mediated ambivalent attachment qualities and affective resolution; it also mediated avoidant attachment qualities and affective resolution. Fit indices for models were adequate only when differences between interpersonal and non-interpersonal events were taken into account. Substantial similarities were found in the relationships among variables for the two models examined, one including coping in general and the other including religious coping. Religious coping provided additional explanatory value to more secular models of coping in a highly religious sample. The implications for assimilating religious coping into mainstream coping research are discussed.

A Systematic Review of Studies Using the Brief COPE: Religious Coping in Factor Analyses

“…Zwingmann et al [126] presented data that suggested that the effects of religious coping on psychosocial adjustment in breast cancer patients were fully mediated by non-religious coping strategies, and Pérez et al [127] found that spiritual striving and depressive symptoms was mediated by acceptance. Burker et al [128], on the other hand, reported findings that religious coping strategies do not appear to be functionally redundant when predicting stress in lung transplant candidates, as did Schottenbauer et al [17] in a large survey of respondents self-identifying as Christian. Other evidence for the unique contribution of religious coping strategies comes from Jermann et al [129], who investigated the effects of mindfulness on depressive symptoms.…”

“…As with the item-level analyses, the samples were very diverse, and the sample sizes varied from 71 [52] to 1289 [17], with a mean of 288.70. Twelve studies [17,18,[52][53][54][55][56][57][58][59][60][61] reported that the turning to religion sub-scale loaded to a factor with at least one other sub-scale, three studies [62][63][64] reported that the turning to religion sub-scale formed its own separate factor, and five studies [21,[65][66][67][68] reported that the religion sub-scale did not have a sufficiently high loading with any other factor. As with the item-level analyses (Table 1), PCA was the most frequently used technique, with 9 of the 20 studies [18,[52][53][54]56,57,62,64,66] explicitly stating this method.…”

“…While sub-scale-level analyses are more robust, findings were still very variable, with three studies [62][63][64] reporting that turning to religion formed a separate factor and five studies [21,[65][66][67][68] reporting lack of sufficiently high factor loadings for religious coping ( Table 2). The use of general or uni-dimensional religious coping measures to inform about the role of religion in coping with stress has been criticized [17,131], and in the Brief COPE [1], the scope that the religious coping sub-scale can assess is even further limited by the fact it was reduced to two items, compared to the four items in the COPE. As the development of Brief COPE [1] has not followed recommended guidelines for developing short forms [132], the unstable factor structure of the instrument is not surprising, and it is therefore also uncertain to what extent sub-scale level analyses may be appropriate without prior formal psychometric testing [133].…”

“…Focus will be given to the sub-scale turning to religion (the two items "I've been trying to find comfort in my religion or spiritual beliefs" and "I've been praying or meditating"), since this sub-scale is reported to behave in very diverse fashions in factor analyses. Schottenbauer et al [17], for example, reported that the turning to religion sub-scale loaded onto a factor together with the sub-scales using emotional support and using instrumental support, and Farley et al [18] found that turning to religion formed a factor together with the sub-sales positive reframing, acceptance, and humor. Religious coping forming its own distinct factor [19,20], or lack of sufficiently high loadings onto any other factor [21,22] is also commonly reported.…”

Posttraumatic Growth and Hope in Parents of Children with Cancer

“…It may be that spirituality and hope are two constructs that work in parallel to facilitate coping and adjustment. Religious coping is highly beneficial in low-control situations (e.g., coping with the life-threatening nature of the child’s illness), whereas hope-thought and problem-focused coping may be more beneficial in high-control situations (e.g., giving the child medicine to alleviate treatment side effects; Schottenbauer, Dougan, Rodriguez, Glass, & Arnkoff, 2006). Therefore, spiritual growth in the context of parenting a child with cancer may be independent of dispositional hope.…”