ABSTRACT
The current study systematically explored and described religious/spiritual (r/s) struggles – distress, tension, and conflict about certain aspects of r/s belief, practice, or experience – in a Veteran sample. Participants were 178 United States Veterans (148 men, 30 women) receiving care at a VA hospital and affiliated outpatient clinics who reported a current r/s struggle. Veterans completed a psychiatric interview and self-report measures of demographics, military experience, and levels of religiousness. They completed self-report scales assessing levels of r/s struggle across different domains (i.e. divine, demonic, interpersonal, moral, doubt, ultimate meaning), provided open-ended descriptions of r/s struggles that were coded for these domains, and reported on a variety of characteristics related to their r/s struggle (e.g., duration, course, perceived cause, perceived impact on life, spiritual growth/decline resulting from the r/s struggle). Descriptive results from quantitative and qualitative data showed that Veterans perceived r/s struggles, particularly moral struggles, as salient and impactful. Veterans reported substantial positive effects and small negative effects of r/s struggles on their psychological and r/s functioning. Higher perceived negative effects were related to higher levels of r/s struggle domains. Statistical analyses comparing levels of r/s struggles and r/s struggle attributes across sample characteristics (e.g., demographics, psychiatric diagnosis, military experience) showed that, after controlling for religiousness, older age showed a positive association with positive perceived adaptation to r/s struggles, whereas the presence of a mental disorder and distressing military experiences showed associations with negative perceived adaptation. We discuss potential implications of these findings for research and clinical work.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.