Religious and Spiritual Coping: Current Research, Future Trends
Kirby Reutter, Ph.D. Gateway Woods Family Services
Over the past seven decades, a growing body of evidence suggests a modest yet consistent and statistically significant association between spirituality and mental health. This relationship is important given that a great majority of Americans report high levels of spirituality. In this chapter, we will review the current evidence of the association between these constructs (including but not limited to our own work). However, the bulk of this research has often confused spirituality with religiosity, or focused on the traditional construct of religion rather than the emergent construct of spirituality. In addition, the majority of these studies have been exclusively correlational in nature, without exploring the mediating or moderating effects of spirituality on mental health. These lapses are both theoretically and clinically problematic for a variety of reasons. In this chapter we will summarize a more recent body of research that has started to explore spirituality in more complex designs (e.g., moderated mediation). We will make recommendations for future research that will help the field mature and develop a fuller understanding of the role of spirituality in mental health, and discuss the challenges and opportunities for using spirituality as a resource in mental health care. Finally, there is growing evidence that younger generations have different attitudes towards religiosity; these changes have implications for spirituality. We will explore this trend and what it means for the mental health of future generations.
Over the past seven decades, a growing body of evidence suggests a modest yet consistent and statistically significant association between spirituality and mental health. This relationship is important given that a great majority of Americans report high levels of spirituality. In this chapter, we will review the current evidence of the association between these constructs (including but not limited to our own work). However, the bulk of this research has often confused spirituality with religiosity, or focused on the traditional construct of religion rather than the emergent construct of spirituality. In addition, the majority of these studies have been exclusively correlational in nature, without exploring the mediating or moderating effects of spirituality on mental health. These lapses are both theoretically and clinically problematic for a variety of reasons. In this chapter we will summarize a more recent body of research that has started to explore spirituality in more complex designs (e.g., moderated mediation). We will make recommendations for future research that will help the field mature and develop a fuller understanding of the role of spirituality in mental health, and discuss the challenges and opportunities for using spirituality as a resource in mental health care. Finally, there is growing evidence that younger generations have different attitudes towards religiosity; these changes have implications for spirituality. We will explore this trend and what it means for the mental health of future generations.
