Spiritual Coping, Emotional Responses to Existential Challenges, and Character Strengths: Revision and Validation of the Using Private Prayer for Coping Scale (UPPC-R)

ABSTRACT

Over recent decades, massive natural disasters have increased in intensity. A 40-year literature review underscored the centrality of spirituality in such disasters but called for further scale development and studies further exploring the role of personality traits. As a response, the current study (1) validated a revised Using Private Prayer for Coping (UPPC-R) scale using data (N = 566) from Category 5 Hurricanes Maria and Michael, and (2) examined the effect of the UPPC-R and perceived spiritual support (PSS) on character strengths, in conjunction with disaster-related emotional responses. Of the sample, 76% used prayer to cope. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses supported a single-factor UPPC-R with strong psychometric properties. A path model demonstrated the mediation of the UPPC-PSS link between faith and character strengths, alongside peritraumatic positive emotional responses. The findings suggest that UPPC-R is an adequate tool for disaster research and that personality traits may vary with disaster-related experiences.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data Availability Statement

Access to the data can be requested by the lead author.

Additional information

Funding

This project was funded by (1) The Fahs-Beck Fund for Research and Experimentation to Ai, and (2) Collaborative Collision Seed Grant from The Office of Proposal Development and the Office of the Vice President for Research at Florida State University to Raney. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript