God image and mood in old age: Results from a community-based pilot study in the Netherlands

Religious involvement is frequently found to be associated with less depression in later life. The emotional aspects of religiousness, such as pertaining to the God–object relationship, have not received substantial attention in empirical research among older adults, and especially not in European samples. As part of a pilot study of the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam, a small sample of older church-members (n?=?60), aged 68–93, filled out a questionnaire, including the Questionnaire God Image on feelings to God and perceptions of God, two of the God Image Scales designed by Lawrence on perceptions of God, the brief positive and negative religious coping scale designed by Pargament, and items on hopelessness, depressive symptoms, and feelings of guilt. Feelings of discontent towards God correlated positively with hopelessness, depressive symptoms, feelings of guilt, and also with depressive symptoms assessed 13 years earlier; these findings pertained to Protestant participants in particular. Most facets of God image, positive, critical, and about punishment reappraisals, were associated with more feelings of guilt. A possible explanation for the most pervasive finding, that feelings of discontent towards God are related to depressive symptoms, is that both, throughout life, remain rooted in insecure attachment styles.     

The association between personality,attachment, psychological distress,church denomination and the god concept among a non-clinical sample

The association between personality, attachment, psychological distress, church denomination and the God concept was studied among a sample of 208 subjects from the normal population. Subjects were Christians, members of an Orthodox reformed church or the Pentecostal church. Negative feelings towards God were associated with a high level of harm avoidance, insecure attachment and a high level of psychological distress. Psychological distress mediated the association between personality and attachment variables and negative feelings towards God. Psychological distress and church denomination were the only two independent predictors of negative feelings towards God. Moreover, results showed that the Orthodox reformed church members hold a more negative concept of God than the Pentecostal church members do. Orthodox reformed church members see God in particular as a punitive judge, independent of personality, attachment and psychological distress, suggesting a large influence of religious culture on this particular type of God concept. Results are discussed from a psychotherapeutic point of view. Finally, several ethical issues regarding psychotherapy with religious clients are addressed.     

Christianity,Personality and Concern about Environmental Pollution among 13‐ to 15‐year‐olds

A sample of 20,968 Year 9 and Year 10 pupils provided information about their concern regarding environmental pollution, belief in God, church attendance, prayer, and view on creationism. They also completed the short form Junior Eysenck Personality Questionnaire. The data demonstrate that (after taking into account sex, age and personality) belief in God, church attendance and personal prayer are all significant predictors of greater environmental concern. After taking these religious factors into account, however, creationist beliefs are irrelevant to environmental concern. These findings are discussed against the background of theory which criticises the Christian tradition for promoting environmental exploitation rather than environmental concern.     

Image of God and personality pathology: An exploratory study among psychiatric patients

The associations between personality pathology according to DSM-IV, symptomatology and God image were examined among a group of 46 psychiatric patients. Features of personality disorders were assessed using the 'Questionnaire to Assess Personality Pathology', a self-report screener. God image was measured by means of the 'Questionnaire God Image'. Symptomatology was assesed by means of the SCL-90. The more personality pathology present, the more negative the image of God. The negative image of God appeared to be associated with personality pathology, in particular with pathology from the DSM-IV A- and C-cluster, even after controlling for the influence of symptomatology, suggesting that the association between symptomatology and the God image is mediated by personality pathology. When symptoms of the A-cluster are present God is experienced as detached and passive. When C-cluster symptoms prevail, God is experienced as a harsh judge. Results are discussed both from a psychodynamic object-relational as well as from a cognitive schema focused perspective.     

Big-Five Personality,Social Worldviews,and Ideological Attitudes: Further Tests of a Dual Process Cognitive-Motivational Model

Abstract

In this study, we extended the Dual Process Model of Ideology and Prejudice by incorporating the Five-Factor Model of Personality (N = 924). Disagreeable people tended to view the social world as competitive, which in turn predicted heightened motivations for group-based dominance and superiority (Social Dominance Orientation or SDO), whereas people low in Openness to Experience and high in Conscientiousness directly expressed heightened security-cohesion motivations (Right-Wing Authoritarianism or RWA). Other personality dimensions were weakly associated with RWA, and these effects were mediated by dangerous worldview. Multiple distinct aspects of personality predict SDO and RWA both directly and indirectly through worldviews, but we found little evidence for the possibility that personality alters the extent to which worldviews (once formed) predict SDO and RWA.     

Gratitude to God,Self‐Rated Health,and Depressive Symptoms

This study has three goals. The first is to see whether the opportunity to engage in volunteer work at church fosters friendships with co‐religionists. The second goal is to see whether the support these friends provide bolsters feelings of gratitude to God. The third goal is to see whether feelings of gratitude to God are associated with health and depressive symptoms. The following linkages in our conceptual model elaborate and extend these objectives: (1) people who go to church more often will be more likely to participate in volunteer work through their congregations; (2) individuals who perform volunteer work at church will have more friends among their co‐religionists; (3) people who have more friends where they worship will report receiving more emotional support from fellow congregants; (4) those who receive more support from co‐religionists will feel more grateful to God; and (5) individuals who are more grateful to God will rate their health in a more favorable manner and experience fewer symptoms of depression. Data from the U.S. Congregational Life Survey provide support for each of these relationships.     

Religiousness and depression: evidence for a main effect and the moderating influence of stressful life events

The association between religiousness and depressive symptoms was examined with meta-analytic methods across 147 independent investigations (N = 98,975). Across all studies, the correlation between religiousness and depressive symptoms was -.096, indicating that greater religiousness is mildly associated with fewer symptoms. The results were not moderated by gender, age, or ethnicity, but the religiousness-depression association was stronger in studies involving people who were undergoing stress due to recent life events. The results were also moderated by the type of measure of religiousness used in the study, with extrinsic religious orientation and negative religious coping (e.g., avoiding difficulties through religious activities, blaming God for difficulties) associated with higher levels of depressive symptoms, the opposite direction of the overall findings.     

Personality,prayer and church attendance among a sample of 11 to 18 year olds in Norway

A series of recent studies has employed various measures of Eysenck's dimensional model of personality alongside questions of frequency of personal prayer and church attendance. The consensus from these studies suggests it is psychoticism, rather than extraversion or neuroticism that is fundamental to a greater frequency of personal prayer and church attendance. The present study tested the generalizability of these findings by examining the association between measure of personal prayer and church attendance and the Revised Eysenck Personality Questionnaire among a sample of 479 11- to 18-year-old Norwegian school children. For the total sample a significant association was found between a greater frequency of both personal prayer and church attendance and lower psychoticism scores. These findings are consistent with previous research and with Eysenck's theory regarding individual differences in social attitudes.     

A structured interview for the assessment of the Five-Factor Model of personality: facet-level relations to the axis II personality disorders

The Structured Interview for the Five-Factor Model (SIFFM; Trull & Widiger, 1997) is an 120-item semistructured interview that assesses both adaptive and maladaptive features of the personality traits included in the five-factor model of personality, or "Big Five." In this article, we evaluate the ability of SIFFM scores to predict personality disorder symptomatology in a sample of 232 adults (46 outpatients and 186 nonclinical college students). Personality disorder symptoms were assessed using the Personality Diagnostic Questionnaire-Revised (PDQ-R; Hyler & Rider, 1987). Results indicated that many of the predicted associations between lower-order personality traits and personality disorders were supported. Further, many of these associations held even after controlling for comorbid personality disorder symptoms. These findings may help inform conceptualizations of the personality disorders, as well as etiological theories and treatment.     

Secure Attachment to God Uniquely Linked to Psychological Health in a National,Random Sample of American Adults

Relationships between religiousness and psychological health are well established. The primary purpose of this study was to investigate whether perceived relationship with God (i.e., attachment to God) or how people view God (i.e., image of God) account for variation in psychological distress and well-being. Statistical relationships between two attachment to God dimensions (avoidance, anxiety), two dimensions of God image (forgiving, wrathful), and general psychological well-being were investigated in a convenience sample (Study 1) and nationally representative sample (Study 2) of American adults who expressed belief in God or a higher power. In both studies, secure attachment to God (i.e., lower avoidance, lower anxiety) and religious service attendance were positively correlated with self-reported psychological well-being. Hierarchical regressions indicated that attachment to God dimensions account for unique variability in reported mental health even after religious service attendance, prayer frequency, God image and demographic variables were statistically controlled. Negligible associations were found between images of God as forgiving or wrathful and psychological well-being. Perceived relationship with God appears to be an important factor in the connection between religiousness and psychological health.     

Attachment to God,depression and loss in late life: a longitudinal study

ABSTRACT

Prior research shows that being anxiously and avoidantly attached to God is associated with psychologically problematic outcomes including depressive feelings. However, a clear understanding of how these insecure attachments to God are associated with depressive feelings is still missing. Therefore, a longitudinal study among 329 nursing home residents aged 65–99 was set up to investigate the prospective relation between anxious and avoidant attachment to God and the experience of depressive feelings, as well as whether this relation is moderated by a loss experience. That is, the loss of close relatives can be particularly stressful in late life, challenging existing attachment relationships and placing older adults at risk for depression. Results confirm that insecure attachments to God are distinctly related to depressive feelings, but that this relation is not moderated by a loss experience. Our results also show that depressive feelings predicts attachment to God, instead of the other way around.     

Predicting dimensions of personality disorder from domains and facets of the Five-Factor Model

We compared the utility of several trait models for describing personality disorder in a heterogeneous clinical sample (N = 94). Participants completed the Schedule for Nonadaptive and Adaptive Personality (SNAP; Clark, 1993b), a self-report measure that assesses traits relevant to personality disorder, and two measures of the Five-Factor Model: the Revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO-PI-R; Costa and McCrae, 1992) and the Big Five Inventory (BFI; John, Donahue, & Kentle, 1991). Regression analyses indicated substantial overlap between the SNAP scales and the NEO-PI-R facets. In addition, use of the NEO-PI-R facets afforded substantial improvement over the Five-Factor Model domains in predicting interview-based ratings of DSM-IV personality disorder (American Psychiatric Association, 1994), such that the NEO facets and the SNAP scales demonstrated roughly equivalent levels of predictive power. Results support assessment of the full range of NEO-PI-R facets over the Five-Factor Model domains for both research and clinical use.     

Comparing persistent juvenile delinquents and normative peers with the Five-Factor Model of Personality

Recent research suggests that personality traits are associated with delinquency. T-tests were run to identify which traits and facets of the Five-Factor Model of Personality contributed to differentiate persistent juvenile delinquents (n = 48) from normative peers (n = 48). Results showed that two traits, namely Agreeableness and Neuroticism, and 12 facets differed significantly between the groups. Observed effect sizes varied from medium to large.     

Personality,religiousness and spirituality – interrelations and structure – in a sample of religious Jewish women

The relations between measures of personality, mystical prayer experience, religious behaviour and multidimensional spirituality were examined on a sample of 121 young religious Jewish Israeli women. Bivariate correlations indicated that while all dimensions of personality were significantly related to some aspects of religiousness and spirituality, conscientiousness and agreeableness were related to most measures. Openness to experience was related to all experiential measures and extroversion was related only to Spiritual Well-being. These results provide support for the generalisability of past research with predominantly Christian samples of varied levels of religiousness and indicate the importance of using multidimensional measures for researching complex constructs such as religiousness and spiritually. In addition, exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses did not provide conclusive support for the notion that religiousness and spirituality constitute a sixth dimension of personality.     

Five-Factor Model Personality Traits, Spirituality/Religiousness, and Mental Health Among People Living With HIV

ABSTRACT We examined the association between five-factor personality domains and facets and spirituality/religiousness as well as their joint association with mental health in a diverse sample of people living with HIV ( n =112, age range 18–66). Spirituality/religiousness showed stronger associations with Conscientiousness, Openness, and Agreeableness than with Neuroticism and Extraversion. Both personality traits and spirituality/religiousness were significantly linked to mental health, even after controlling for individual differences in demographic measures and disease status. Personality traits explained unique variance in mental health above spirituality and religiousness. Further, aspects of spirituality and religiousness were found to mediate some of the links between personality and mental health in this patient sample. These findings suggest that underlying personality traits contribute to the beneficial effects of spirituality/religiousness among vulnerable populations.     

Personality and Religion Among Music Students

A sample of 422 students attending courses in eleven departments or colleges of music completed the short form of the Revised Eysenck Personality Questionnaire together with the Francis Scale of Attitude toward Christianity and measures of prayer and church attendance. In comparison with the population norms, both male and female music students recorded significantly higher scores on the extraversion scale and significantly lower scores on the psychoticism scale. The data confirm that psychoticism is the dimension of personality fundamental to individual differences in religiosity.     

Lifetime Trauma,Prayer, and Psychological Distress in Late Life

The purpose of this study is to see whether prayer helps older people cope more effectively with the adverse effects of lifetime trauma. Data from a nationwide survey of older adults reveal that the size of the relationship between traumatic events and depressive symptoms is reduced for older people who believe that only God knows when it is best to answer a prayer and when they believe that only God knows the best way to answer it. The findings further reveal that these beliefs about prayer outcomes are especially likely to offset the effects of traumatic events that arose during childhood.     

The Croatian version of the Emotion Regulation Questionnaire: Links with higher- and lower-level personality traits and mood

The Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (ERQ) measures habitual use of two emotion regulation strategies, cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression. The present study tested the psychometric properties and validity of a newly developed Croatian adaptation of the ERQ. In a sample of 347 participants, we first sought to confirm the ERQ's original factor structure. Next, we tested its convergent, divergent and incremental validity. In the first subsample (N = 140), we linked the ERQ with a measure of the Five-Factor Model dimensions and their facets (Revised NEO Personality Inventory). In the second subsample (N = 207), we tested its ability to predict personality dimensions assessed by a different measure (Big Five Inventory) as well as the traits of positive and negative affect, including its incremental validity in predicting the latter. The results corroborated earlier findings, showing that the Croatian ERQ has equivalent psychometrics and predictive validity as ERQs in other languages. Crucially, the observed links between the ERQ and the facets of the Five-Factor Model dimensions enrich our understanding of the personality mechanisms behind the employment of these emotion regulation strategies.     

Abuse and religious experience: A study of religiously committed evangelical adults

Two hypotheses were tested: (1) in a sample of religiously-committed evangelical adults, past experience of abuse is related to more frequent (a) religious behaviour such as prayer, church attendance and Bible reading, and (b) religious experiences, such as religious visions, healings and speaking in tongues; (2) abuse is also associated with evidence of alienation from God, as noted in more frequent reports of God as distant and more frequent religious doubting. Survey data from 3424 adults attending one of four new evangelical movement churches were analysed. Controlling for socio-economic and religious socialization variables, a series of regression equations were calculated looking at the relationship between the experience of abuse and the dependent variables of three factor scores representing conventional religious behaviour, transcendent religious experience and feelings of distance from God. Self-report of the frequency of abuse was positively associated with frequency of reported transcendent religious experiences and with feelings of distance from God. A significant relationship between abuse and more conventional religious behaviour was not found. The findings provide mixed support for the idea that abuse results in ambivalent responses toward religion and God in religiously committed adults. The lack of relationship between abuse and conventional religious behaviours is somewhat inconsistent with prior results, and likely represents a ceiling effect. The positive correlation with transcendent religious experiences and distance from God are consistent with prior studies, but may suggest alternative explanations.     

An examination of attachment,religiousness, spirituality and well-being in a Baptist faith sample

The purpose of this research was to examine a mediational model of attachment, religiousness and spirituality in predicting well-being in people of Christian faith. One hundred and eighty-five participants were recruited from Baptist churches and 19 from a Baptist-based university. Whereas no support was found for a mediational model of attachment, religiousness and spirituality in predicting well-being, support was found for a path model whereby greater levels of insecure attachment to God were associated with lower levels of religious spirituality (RS). In turn, lower levels of RS were associated with greater levels of emotional distress (ED). Therefore, for this sample of Baptists, having a secure attachment to God was related to an increase in religious behaviours, fulfilment with one's prayer life and belief in a purpose for life. It seems that increases in these religious and spiritual variables are related to less ED. This suggests that heightened connection with God, both through religious behaviours and heightened spirituality, is a beneficial pursuit for people of Christian faith.