The Moderating Relationship of Spirituality on Negative Life Events and Psychological Adjustment

Abstract

The authors used a path model to examine how spirituality moderates relationships between negative life experiences and psychological adjustment, operationalized for this study as levels of depression and anxiety. Results suggest that spirituality provides a significant moderating effect for both depression and anxiety. The moderating effect was stronger for depression than for anxiety.

The Impact of Child Abuse on the Psycho-Spiritual and Religious Status of Maltese College Students

“…Pargament (1996) suggested that certain spiritual factors, such as religious coping methods, have been found to predict adjustment over and above the effects of non-religious coping. Ellison (1991) and others (Flaherty 1992;Lawson et al 1998;Murphy et al 2000;Ross 1990;Young et al 2000) found consistent indications in their studies that spirituality plays a vital role as a coping mechanism, against negative life events. Results from the path analysis suggest two things: first, that abuse had no direct effect on spirituality, and second, that spirituality had a direct impact on positive affect, but not on negative affect.…”

“…Research by Galea et al (2007) also indicated spirituality's incremental validity to well-being, over and above personality, to child abuse victims. Although many studies have suggested the potential resourcefulness of spirituality against negative events (Marrone 1999;Galea et al 2007;Sullivan 1993;Young et al 2000), it is still unclear how such interaction occurs.…”

“…Thus, Miller and Thoresen (1999) suggested that differentiating spirituality (as an individual attribute), from religion (as an organized social entity), is very helpful. Empirical research has looked at the value of spirituality to wellbeing specifically from three perspectives: as a coping mechanism against negative events, as a social support, and as providing meaningfulness in life (Ellison 1991;Marrone 1999;Young et al 2000). For the purpose of this study, Piedmont's (2001) definition that spirituality is the individual's "efforts to construe a broad sense of personal meaning within an eschatological context" (p. 5) is chosen.…”

Disordered eating and self-objectification in college women: clarifying the roles of spirituality and purpose in life

“…He posits that religiousness has the greatest impact as a moderator when stress levels are high. Previous research examining spirituality/religiousness and various health variables found moderator relationships (e.g., spirituality moderated the relationship between negative life experiences and depression/anxiety) (Miller & Thoresen, 2003;Young, Cashwell, & Shcherbakova, 2000). Several studies have suggested that incorporating spirituality into the treatment of eating disorders correlates with better treatment outcomes (Jacobs-Pilipski, Winzelberg, Wilfley, Bryson, & Taylor, 2005;Richards, Hardman, & Berrett, 2007;Smith, Hardman, Richards, & Fischer, 2003;Smith, Richards, & Maglio, 2004).…”

Healing the Healers: A Profile of Strengths and Weaknesses of Catholic Priests in Gozo, Malta

“…Empirical research regarding the value of spirituality to well-being seems to suggest in particular three perspectives: as a coping mechanism against negative life events, as a social support, and as providing meaningfulness in life (Ellison 1991;Marrone 1999;Young et al 2000). A number of studies indicated that spirituality benefits and sometimes predicts wellbeing (Galea et al 2007;Smith et al 2003).…”