Does Christian Spirituality Enhance Psychological Interventions on Forgiveness, Gratitude, and the Meaning of Life? A Quasi-Experimental Intervention with the Elderly and Youth

Abstract

Scientific research has provided theoretical evidence on the implementation of religious/spiritual interventions (RSI) as a complementary health therapy, where spiritual improvements are also a factor to consider. Despite the above, there are few studies that have evaluated the clinical applicability of these findings. This study was an intervention with older and younger adults divided into two treatment groups and one control group. What is expected is that the two treatment groups will score better than the control group; however, the group with a Christian spiritual focus is expected to perform better than the group without a spiritual focus. Measures of gratitude, meaning of life, forgiveness, spirituality, religiosity, and expected prejudice were recorded. The hypothesis is fulfilled that Christian spirituality enhances psychological interventions on factors associated with personal well-being, mainly in older adults: spirituality (M = 26.00, SE = 2.127/M = 29.38, SE = 1.953, t (12) = −2.436, p M = 22.92, SE = 1.022/M = 24.54, SE = 0.739, t (12) = −2.298, p M = 17.31, SE = 1.554/M = 21.08, SE = 1.603, t (12) = −3.310, p < 0.05, r = 0.69). The most powerful results of the study are those associated with religiosity/spirituality.

Keywords

• religion–spirituality
• Christianity
• religious–spiritual prejudice
• forgiveness
• gratitude
• meaning of life