Correlates of self-perceptions of spirituality in American adults

Abstract

To advance knowledge in the study of spirituality and physical health, we examined sociodemographic, behavioral, and attitudinal correlates of self-perceptions of spirituality. Participants were a nationally representative sample of 1,422 adult respondents to the 1998 General Social Survey. They were asked, among other things, to rate themselves on the depth of their spirituality and the depth of their religiousness. Results indicated that, after adjustment for religiousness, self-perceptions of spirituality were positively correlated with being female (r = .07, p < .01), having a higher education (r = .12, p < .001), and having no religion (r = .10, p < .001) and inversely correlated with age (r = -.06, p < .05) and being Catholic (r = -.08, p < .01). After adjustment for these sociodemographic factors, self-perceptions of spirituality were associated with high levels of religious or spiritual activities (range in correlations = .12-.38, all p < .001), low cynical mistrust, and low political conservatism (both r = -.08, p < .01). The population was divided into 4 groups based on their self-perceptions of degree of spirituality and degree of religiousness. The spiritual and religious group had a higherfrequency of attending services, praying, meditating, reading the Bible, and daily spiritual experience than any of the other 3 groups (all differences p < .05) and had less distress and less mistrust than the religious-only group (p < .05 for both). However, they were also more intolerant than either of the nonreligious groups (p < .05 for both) and similar on intolerance to the religious-only group. We conclude that sociodemographicfactors could confound any observed association between spirituality and health and should be controlled. Moreover, individuals who perceive themselves to be both spiritual and religious may be at particularly low risk for morbidity and mortality based on their good psychological status and ongoing restorative activities.

Religion, Spirituality, and Positive Psychology in Adulthood: A Developmental View

“…Streib et al (2009), on the basis of extensive empirical research, observe that across cultural boundaries and religious traditions, people may describe themselves as ''equally religious and spiritual, more religious than spiritual, more spiritual than religious,'' or ''neither religious nor spiritual,'' and that this may shift according to personal history and socialization, critical life events, and important developmental transitions interacting with periods in the life cycle. The same authors observe that most respondents described themselves as religious and spiritual, in keeping with the findings of Zinnbauer et al (1997), Cook et al (2000), Shahabi et al (2002), and Corrigan et al (2003). Together, these researchers observe that despite the contrasting positions of religion and spirituality in a small minority of subjects, and the use of ''spiritual'' as an explicitly anti-religious term in an even smaller subgroup of this minority, spiritual growth is viewed as something that can and does occur in what most subjects perceive to be the highly supportive framework of religion.…”

Religion, Spirituality, and Well-Being Across Nations: The Eudaemonic and Hedonic Happiness Investigation

“…This interpretation is consistent with Eckersley's ( 2007 ) remark that spirituality is most commonly represented via religion which typically involves an institutionalized process of worshipping a higher being. This perspective is also consistent with fi ndings indicating that those who consider themselves religious also tend to report being spiritual (Joshanloo 2010 ;Shahabi et al 2002 ) . An alternative explanation may be that South Africans incorporate into their lives high levels of both religiousness and spirituality, perceived as two separate constructs which are developed through different mechanisms and behaviors.…”

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