Wisdom as the mediator in the relationships between religious meaning system and attitude toward death among older adults

Abstract

The objective of the present research was to investigate whether wisdom is a mediator in the association between the religious meaning system and the attitude toward death in the period of late adulthood. The study included 315 persons aged 60–75. Three measures were used: Religious Meaning System Scale (RMSS), Three-Dimensional Wisdom Scale (3D-WS), Death Attitude Profile-Revised (DAP-R). The analyses allowed for a partial verification of the hypothesis that wisdom is a mediator in the relationship between the explicit religious meaning system and the multidimensional attitude toward death in late adulthood. It was confirmed that the relationship of the religious meaning system with fear of death, death avoidance, neutral acceptance, escape acceptance and approach acceptance is mediated by at least one (cognitive, reflective and/or affective) of the dimensions considered in the study.