Does Spirituality Represent the Sixth Factor of Personality? Spiritual Transcendence and the Five‐Factor Model

Abstract

This study reports on the development of the Spiritual Transcendence Scale, a measure designed to capture aspects of the individual that are independent of the qualities contained in the Five-Factor Model of Personality (FFM). Using two separate samples of undergraduate students including both self-report (Ns = 379 and 356) and observer data (N = 279), it was shown that Spiritual Transcendence: (a) was independent of measures of the FFM; (b) evidenced good cross-observer convergence; and (c) predicted a wide range of psychologically salient outcomes, even after controlling for the predictive effects of personality. Given the long theoretical pedigree of Transcendence in the psychological literature, it was argued that Spiritual Transcendence represents a broad-based motivational domain of comparable breadth to those constructs contained in the FFM and ought to be considered a potential sixth major dimension of personality."Evidently, then, the science and the religion are both of them genuine keys for unlocking the world's treasure-house to him who

Gratitude in Intermediate Affective Terrain: Links of Grateful Moods to Individual Differences and Daily Emotional Experience.

“…In Study 1 we examined the associations of several personality and affective traits with individual differences in the People with high levels of spiritual transcendence (Piedmont, 1999) also experienced higher mean levels of gratitude in their daily moods than did people lower in spiritual transcendence. These findings corroborate McCullough et al's (2002) findings regarding the spiritual correlates of gratitude, here extended to the realm of daily mood.…”

Five-Factor Structure of the Spiritual Transcendence Scale and Its Relationship with Clinical Psychological Distress in Emerging Adults

“…The Spiritual Transcendence Scale (STS) (Piedmont 1999) is a 24-item scale measuring spiritual transcendence with item responses ranging from (1) Strongly Disagree to (5) Strongly Agree. Greater scores represent higher levels of spirituality.…”

“…Greater scores represent higher levels of spirituality. Psychometric properties for the STS and problems related to them are discussed at length above (see Akyalcin et al 2008;de Jager Meezenbroek et al 2012;Lau et al 2015;Piedmont 1999Piedmont , 2007Piedmont and Leach 2002).…”

“…First, a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) using maximum likelihood estimation was performed to examine the three-factor STS model proposed by Piedmont (1999). Next, exploratory factor analyses (EFAs) using principal axis factoring were performed to determine an alternative latent factor structure.…”

Spirituality — religion — health. Youth’s mental health in light of the indicators of spiritual well-being

“…A spirituális jóllétnek pedig különösen nagy jelentôsége lehet a serdülôk mentális egészségének megôrzésében; hiszen összefüggésben áll azzal, ahogyan a fiatalok ön-magukhoz, másokhoz és Istenhez (vagy valamilyen magasabb természet-feletti erôhöz), az élet értelméhez és az életeseményekhez, valamint az életcélokhoz viszonyulnak (Gomez & Fisher, 2003;Cotton és mtsai, 2009). A spiritualitás tehát fontos alkotóeleme a személyiségnek és kihat az identitás alakulására is (Piedmont, 1999;Pecchenino, 2009). Jelen vizsgálatban a spirituális jóllét két dimenziója, azaz a vallási és az egzisztenciális jóllét, valamint a mentális egészség két indikátora, a depressziós tünetegyüttes és az élettel való elégedettség között kerestünk összefüggéseket; bevonva az elemzésbe további változókat is (az optimizmust és a belsô/külsô kontrollt), amelyek a mentális egészség szempontjából potenciális védôfaktorként funkcionálhatnak (vö.…”