Medicine for the Spirit: Religious Coping in Individuals with Medical Conditions

Cummings, Jeremy P.; Pargäment, Kenneth I.

doi:10.3390/rel1010028

Cited by 117 publications

(103 citation statements)

References 100 publications

(188 reference statements)

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“…Religious coping is the most common reaction to health problems and disorders (25). Patients who are spiritual may use their beliefs to cope with disease, pain, and stressful situations.…”

Section: Compliance and Copingmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Impact of Spirituality on Health

2016

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Context: The impact of spirituality on recovery from disease and the promotion of health is a topic that has received the attention of many researchers and scholars around the world. Spirituality is considered one of the natural capacities of humans that has positive effects on individuals' health. The aim of this study was to review the impact of spirituality on people's health and to discuss the relationship between health and belief in spiritual powers. Evidence Acquisition: This study comprised a non-systematic narrative review of original and reliable scientific articles on spirituality published from 1972 to 2014. The research strategy was carried out using electronic databases such as Scopus, PubMed, and Google Scholar. Considering the goal of the research, 51 articles were selected and reviewed. Results: Most studies indicated the positive impact of spirituality on people's health. Recourse to spiritual powers leads to reductions in anxiety and concern among patients and their families, and allows people to more easily accept and cope with their health disorders. Conclusions: To date, most of the studies conducted on the topic have confirmed the positive impact of religious beliefs and other spiritual approaches on health and the course of recovery from acute and chronic diseases. Based on these findings, medical personnel should turn their attention to the advantages of spirituality in relation to patients' treatment and acquaint patients and their families with such spiritual benefits.

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“…Religious coping is the most common reaction to health problems and disorders (25). Patients who are spiritual may use their beliefs to cope with disease, pain, and stressful situations.…”

Section: Compliance and Copingmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Impact of Spirituality on Health

2016

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“…In contrast, NRC, (i.e., feeling angry or distant toward God or members of the church and pleading with God for a miracle), predicted increased levels of distress. Overall, in a variety of studies, NRC consistently has been linked with deleterious outcomes [50].…”

Section: Spiritual Copingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Complicated Grief in the Aftermath of Homicide: Spiritual Crisis and Distress in an African American Sample

Neimeyer

Burke

2011

Religions

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Both grieving the loss of a loved one and using spirituality or religion as an aid in doing so are common behaviors in the wake of death. This longitudinal examination of 46 African American homicide survivors follows up on our earlier study that established the relation between positive and negative religious coping on the one hand and complicated grief (CG) on the other. In the current report, we broadened this focus to determine the relation between religious coping and other bereavement outcomes, including posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression, to establish whether religious coping more strongly predicted bereavement distress or vice versa. We also sought to determine if the predictive power of CG in terms of religious coping over time exceeded that of PTSD and depression. Our results suggested a link between negative religious coping (NRC) and all forms of bereavement distress, whereas no such link was found between positive religious coping (PRC) and bereavement outcomes in our final analyses. Significantly, only CG prospectively predicted high levels of spiritual struggle six months later. Clinical implications regarding spiritually sensitive interventions are noted.

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“…Cummings and Pargament (2010, p. 30) state that "religious coping occurs when a stressor related to a sacred goal arises or when people call upon a coping method they view as sacred in response to a stressor". The literature has demonstrated significant links between religious coping and a variety of criteria of mental health (Cummings and Pargament 2010;Pargament et al 2013). A large number of researchers have developed numerous studies of religious coping.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Brazilian Validation of the Brief Scale for Spiritual/Religious Coping—SRCOPE-14

et al. 2018

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Abstract:The concept of spiritual-religious coping gained attention in Brazil with the adaptation and validation of the RCOPE Scale (Panzini 2004; long version: 87 items and brief version: 49 items). The Brief RCOPE still contains a large number of items, so attempts to further reduce the size of the measure are relevant. This study presents the validation process of the Brief SRCOPE scale (14 items) for use in the Brazilian context. Data were collected from the general population (N = 525) and subjected to exploratory factor analysis (EFA; n = 249) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA; n = 276). The EFA resulted in a two-factor solution: Positive Religious Coping (PRC) and Negative Religious Coping (NRC). All 14 items of the original scale were retained and correlated with the same factor as the original scale (KMO = 0.852; 58.15% of total variance explained; PRC Cronbach's alpha = 0.884 and NRC Cronbach's alpha = 0.845). The model tested through CFA showed adequate adjustment indices (χ 2 = 146.809, DF = 70, χ 2 /DF = 2.097, NFI = 0.93, CFI = 0.962, GFI = 0.930, AGFI = 0.895, RMSEA = 0.063, PCLOSE = 0.065 and SRMR = 0.0735). The Brief SRCOPE Scale-14 has shown reliability for the studied sample and might be applicable to other contexts. It may ultimately prove useful to professionals and researchers interested in better knowing how people make use of religious coping to face stress and suffering.

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Medicine for the Spirit: Religious Coping in Individuals with Medical Conditions

Cited by 117 publications

References 100 publications

The Impact of Spirituality on Health

The Impact of Spirituality on Health

Complicated Grief in the Aftermath of Homicide: Spiritual Crisis and Distress in an African American Sample

Brazilian Validation of the Brief Scale for Spiritual/Religious Coping—SRCOPE-14

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