I say a little prayer for my singlehood: exploring the role of prayer for single adults’ mental health

ABSTRACT

Past research has suggested that religion plays an important role in single individuals’ functioning. However, little is known about the role of prayer in single adults’ mental health. Therefore, the present investigation examined whether adoration, confession, thanksgiving, supplication, and reception prayer concerning singlehood would moderate the changes in anxiety, depression, and emotional and psychological well-being of Polish single individuals (N = 335 at Time 1) over six months. The analyses showed that among single religious followers, none of the five types of prayer were related to changes in anxiety and depression; however, confession, thanksgiving and reception prayer were related to increased emotional well-being among those who did not pray, and confession prayer was related to decreased psychological well-being among those who prayed. In a sample of nonreligious followers, the analysis suggested the possibility that adoration prayer might be related to decreased anxiety. The study implies that prayer concerning singlehood can be particularly important for single religious followers’ changes in emotional and psychological well-being compared to nonreligious followers and that the temporal effect of prayer concerning singlehood is characterised by high selectiveness and uniqueness depending on the type of prayer, whether prayer is practiced, indicators of mental health and religious identity.

Plain Language Summary

The study contributes to a better understanding of the role of prayer in the changes in the mental health of Polish single adults who are religious and nonreligious followers. The article shows the results of the study with two assessments within a 6-month interval in which five types of prayer (adoration, confession, thanksgiving, supplication, and reception) concerning singlehood and four indicators of mental health (anxiety, depression, emotional and psychological well-being) were assessed. The analysis revealed that among single religious followers, changes in anxiety and depression were not related to any type of prayer concerning singlehood; increased emotional well-being was related to confession, reception and thanksgiving prayer concerning singlehood, but only among those individuals who did not pray. In turn, decreased psychological well-being was associated with confession, but only among those single individuals who prayed. Finally, four types of prayer concerning singlehood were not related to changes in mental health among single nonreligious followers; however, our results suggest that adoration prayer concerning singlehood may be related to the decline in anxiety. These findings are interesting because they provide richer insight into how the specific types of prayer concerning singlehood relate in a long-term perspective to the diverse indicators of mental health of single individuals and unveil the complex nature of prayer in the context of singlehood.

KEYWORDS:

• Mental health
• prayer
• religiosity
• singlehood

The diversity of contemporary romantic relationships is characterised by the existence of various alternative marital and family forms, including singlehood (e.g. Beckmeyer and Jamison 2023), broadly defined as not being in a marital or informal relationship, as not having a romantic partner/spouse (e.g. Adamczyk 2021; DePaulo and Morris 2005; Girme, Park, and MacDonald 2023; Mortelmans, Claessens, and Thielemans 2023). Moreover, the number of single individuals has been indicated to be on the rise in the United States of America and Canada, as well as in many European and Asian countries (Adamczyk and Trepanowski 2023; Girme, Park, and MacDonald 2023; van den Berg and Verbakel 2022). The increasing rates of single people enhance, in turn, researchers’ efforts to recognise factors related to positive and negative mental health outcomes among single adults and explore factors that can mitigate the negative consequences of singlehood (e.g. Adamczyk 2023; Girme, Park, and MacDonald 2023; Kislev 2019).

In the pursuit of factors associated with single people’s health, religion and religious communities have been recently indicated as factors that may play an important role in the link between single status and well-being (e.g. Girme, Park, and MacDonald 2023; Himawan et al. 2023; Lianda, Ch, and Himawan 2022). This recent attention drawn to the role of religion for single individuals is also prompted by the results of past studies. For instance, single people were found to report higher religious activity and personal relationships with God and higher significance of religious beliefs (Granqvist and Hagekull 2000). Religion and spirituality have also been considered both positive and negative strategies to cope with societal and personal challenges related to single status (Himawan et al. 2018a, 2018b; Himawan 2020a, 2020b; Himawan et al. 2023; Lianda, Ch, and Himawan 2022). Although these studies provided important insight into the role religion and spirituality for single people, they have largely overlooked the issue of prayer in reference to singlehood.

This omission of prayer and its role in the experience of singlehood is, in turn, quite surprising due to at least two notions. First, prayer is one of the most important aspects of the religious/spiritual life of many individuals (e.g. Laird et al. 2004; Newman and Graham 2018; Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023; Zarzycka and Krok 2021; Zarzycka et al. 2022) and represents the manner in which religion can be practiced the most frequently (Bartczuk and Zarzycka 2020); furthermore, in many religions, some forms of prayer or communication with a higher being are described (e.g. Newman and Graham 2018).

Second, singlehood may be experienced by some individuals as a difficult and stressful life situation that negatively affects mental health (Adamczyk 2021, 2023; Girme, Park, and MacDonald 2023; Jackson 2018). In turn, religiosity and prayer have been considered to be related to the quality of life and its perception (e.g. Poloma and Pendleton 1989). For instance, previous studies have shown that prayer has beneficial associations with mental health outcomes, such as psychological distress, depression, life satisfaction, and happiness (Bradshaw and Kent 2018), that it can operate as an effective strategy in coping with personal problems (Parks-Stamm, Pollack, and Hill 2020), and that it brings personal and interpersonal emotional benefits (McCulloch and Parks-Stamm 2020).

Furthermore, numerous cross-sectional studies focusing on the frequency of prayer demonstrated that individuals who more frequently prayed also reported greater happiness and well-being, although in other research, the link between prayer frequency and well-being was not observed or was found to be negative (Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023). At the same time, prayer has also been considered to contribute to external attributions leading to greater salience of negative experiences and unfulfilled expectations, greater anxiety and stress (see Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023). In sum, past studies have provided contradictory results showing the lack of links between prayer and mental health outcomes or, in contrast, showing the positive or negative links between prayer and various indicators of mental health (see Bradshaw, Ellison, and Flannelly 2008, 2018; Masters and Spielmans 2007; Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023; Zarzycka et al. 2022).

Moving beyond the consideration of the mere frequency of prayer, researchers also attempted to capture the content of prayer and offered its various taxonomies (see Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023, for a review). For instance, Laird et al. (2004) proposed five types of prayer based on content: adoration, confession, thanksgiving, and supplication. In brief, adoration is a prayer related to worshiping God without reference to external circumstances or needs; confession means acknowledgement of faults, misdeeds, or shortcomings and request for forgiveness; thanksgiving is defined as the expression of gratitude to God for positive life circumstances; supplication means making a request related to external life circumstances pertaining to oneself or others; reception is prayer of a contemplative or receptive nature associated with passively waiting for divine wisdom, understanding, or guidance (Laird et al. 2004; Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023; Zarzycka and Krok 2021).

Past research has also suggested that various types of prayer may be uniquely related to different measures of quality of life (Poloma and Pendleton 1989) and well-being (You and Yoo 2016). For instance, Whittington and Scher (2010) found that subjective well-being, self-esteem, optimism, and a feeling of having meaning in life were positively related to adoration, thanksgiving, and reception prayers but negatively related to confession, supplication, and obligation prayers (i.e. prayers to fulfil obligations and guidelines dictated by the religion and often involving ritual elements; Whittington and Scher 2010). In a Korean sample, You and Yoo (2016) determined that thanksgiving prayer was positively associated with subjective well-being, whereas supplication prayer was negatively related to subjective well-being. In a recent Polish study, Zarzycka et al. (2022) showed that all five types of prayer were positively related to life satisfaction and religious and existential well-being, supplication and reception prayers were positively related to anxiety, whereas depression was not associated with any form of prayer (Zarzycka et al. 2022). Furthermore, a recent study using daily diary methods demonstrated that present-day supplication, thanksgiving, and adoration prayers negatively predicted well-being the following day; however, the effects were weaker among individuals who prayed more consistently each day (Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023).

Notably, even among individuals who do not affiliate with any religion, many of them still occasionally pray (Mrdjenovich 2019; Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023). The tendency to pray in times of need was also observed among nonreligious individuals who were likely to display supplicatory prayer (Murray et al. 2004). Furthermore, a recent meta-analysis by Speed and Hwang (2019) revealed that individuals who identified as religious but did not believe in god(s) (or identified with a nontheistic religion) experienced a negative link between prayer and health outcomes. In turn, individuals who believed in god(s) but did not identify themselves as being religiously affiliated reported the greatest benefit from prayer (Speed and Hwang 2019). Finally, previous research investigating prayer and utilising the 21-item Multidimensional Prayer Inventory (MPI) to its assessment (Laird et al. 2004) included samples of atheists/agnostics and individuals belonging to various religions and denominations (e.g. Whittington and Scher 2010).

The current study

The recently emphasised factors related to positive and adverse mental health outcomes as a function of singlehood (Adamczyk 2021, 2023; Girme, Park, and MacDonald 2023; Kislev 2019) in connection with the gap in knowledge on the role of prayer in single adults’ mental health encouraged the present authors to explore the long-term role of five types of prayer (i.e. adoration, confession, thanksgiving, supplication, and reception; Laird et al. 2004) concerning singlehood for single adults’ mental health outcomes measured in terms of anxiety, depression, emotional and psychological well-being over the course of six months.

The results presented in the current paper are a part of a larger project on adult singlehood in Poland and associated life outcomes. In this larger project and in the paper, we employed a broad social perspective in defining singlehood as not being in a marital or informal relationship, as not having a romantic partner/spouse (e.g. Adamczyk 2021; DePaulo and Morris 2005; Girme, Park, and MacDonald 2023; Mortelmans, Claessens, and Thielemans 2023) for at least six months (e.g. Hoan and MacDonald 2024).

In the present investigation, we employed a 6-month interval between two assessments, similar to other studies investigating the role of religion in mental health (e.g. Rosmarin et al. 2017). As a result, the longitudinal design of the current study allowed us to examine the idea that the changes in single individuals’ mental health assessed at Time 1 (T1) and after six months (Time 2; T2) would be moderated by the five types of prayer concerning singlehood.

In the present study, other researchers’ postulates were also effectively applied to examine the associations between religion and psychological processes, taking into account multiple religious groups, including non-believers (Mrdjenovich 2019; Shiah et al. 2013; Speed and Hwang 2019). Specifically, due to the diversity of religious affiliations of the current samples and the presence of individuals who defined themselves as being or not being religious followers, the present investigation provided an excellent opportunity to explore the role of prayer concerning singlehood in single adults’ mental health, taking into account the issue of religious identity (i.e. an indication whether an individual is religiously affiliated; see Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023).

Due to the exploratory nature of the current study and several contradictory and inconclusive results in past literature pertaining to the associations between prayer and mental health (see Bradshaw and Kent 2018; Masters and Spielmans 2007; Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023), we have not formulated specific hypotheses. Instead, we formulated one major, open research question: What role do five types of prayer (adoration, confession, thanksgiving, supplication, and reception) concerning singlehood play in the changes in mental health outcomes measured in terms of anxiety, depression, and emotional and psychological well-being over the course of six months among single individuals, and is this role similar among religious and nonreligious followers? In other words, the goal of the current study was to determine the moderating effect of individual differences in five types of prayer concerning singlehood on single individuals’ changes in mental health depending on being or not being religious followers.

Method

Participants and procedure

Regarding the recognition of Facebook as a valuable tool for survey research, although not without some limitations (e.g. Schneider and Harknett 2022), we decided to enrol the potential participants, we disseminated the invitation to participate in the current study via advertisements posted on Facebook. The advertisements were related to the official Facebook profile of the current project and targeted individuals whose relationship status was acknowledged to be single and who were aged at least 18 years old. No other inclusion criteria were applied in the recruitment strategy. Ethical approval was obtained from the Ethics Committee for Research with the People as Study Participants at the Faculty of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, Poland (Decision number: 2/07/2020).

The online survey was performed via the Qualtrics platform between May 2022 and October 2022. As a form of compensation, the participants had the possibility of winning vouchers for a Polish bookstore in a lottery. The dataset collected at T1 and T2 is available at the Open Science Repository (OSF) at https://osf.io/3kv6h/?view_only=4848a7ba754b4ea98d0832a1723e1c16.

Initially, 439 participants began the survey, but 104 did not complete the survey or completed it twice. Therefore, the total sample at T1 involved 335 single Polish participants (60.70% of females) aged 19–51 (M = 32.23, SD = 6.44) with a mean duration of singlehood of 10.70 years (SD = 11.16). In terms of religious identity, 51% of participants (n = 171) indicated being religious followers, whereas 49% of participants (n = 164) declared being nonreligious followers. In the follow-up study, 93 participants dropped out after six months, and 242 participants remained (an attrition rate of 27.76%). The analyses revealed that respondents who dropped out of the study were more likely to have a child/children, φ = .18, p < .001, and were more likely to be divorced, Cramer’s V = .18, p = .049. These differences were, however, small in magnitude. The detailed characteristics of the sample at T1 and T2 as a function of attrition rate are provided in Table 1.

Table 1. Sample characteristics of the total sample at time 1 and time 2 and as a function of attrition rate between time 1 and time 2.

		W1-W2 Attrition Comparisons
Variable	Total sample at T1 (N = 335)	Participants who were at T1 and T2 (n = 242)	Participants who were at T1 and dropped at T2 (n = 93)	Difference
Demographic variables
Age, years				p = .293
Range	19–51	19–51	19–49
M (SD)	32.47 (6.68)	32.23 (6.44)	33.09 (7.27)
Gender, n (%)				p = .516
Female	202 (60.30%)	147 (60.70%)	55 (59.10%)
Male	130 (38.80%)	92 (38.00%)	38 (40.90%)
Other	3 (0.90%)	3 (1.20%)	–
Place of residence, n (%)				p = .153
Village	27 (10.00%)	18 (7.40%)	9 (9.70%)
City <10, 000	7 (3.50%)	7 (2.90%)	–
City 11,000–50,000	30 (11.30%)	22 (9.10%)	8 (8.60%)
City 51,000–100,000	23 (7.30%)	17 (7.00%)	6 (6.50%)
City 101,000–499,000	71 (20.30%)	68 (24.40%)	13 (14.00%)
City >500,000	177 (47.70%)	120 (49.60%)	57 (61.30%)
Highest education, n (%)				p = .250
Primary education	3 (0.90%)	1 (0.40%)	2 (2.20%)
Lower secondary education	–	–	–
Vocational education	3 (0.90%)	3 (1.20%)	–
High school	58 (17.30%)	42 (17.40%)	16 (17.20%)
B.A. degree	53 (15.80%)	34 (14.00%)	19 (20.40%)
M.A. degree	199 (59.40%)	146 (60.30%)	53 (57.00%)
Ph.D. and higher	19 (5.70%)	16 (6.60%)	3 (3.20%)
Relationship status, n (%)				p = .049
Never-married	303 (90.40%)	226 (93.40%)	77 (82.80%)
Divorced	29 (8.70%)	15 (4.50%)	14 (15.10%)
Separated	2 (0.60%)	1 (0.40%)	1 (1.10%)
Widowed	1 (0.30%)	–	1 (1.10%)
Length of singlehood (in years), M (SD)	10.98 (11.49)	10.70 (11.16)	11.71 (12.36)	p = .473
Having children, n (%)				p = .001
Yes	25 (7.50%)	11 (4.50%)	14 (15.1%)
No	310 (92.50%)	231 (95.50%)	79 (84.90%)
Religious identity, n (%)				p = .709
Yes	171 (51.00%)	122 (50.40%)	49 (52.70%)
No	164 (49.00%)	120 (49.60%)	44 (47.30%)
Religion, n (%)				p = .487
Roman Catholic	148 (44.20%)	110 (45.50%)	38 (40.90%)
Protestant	4 (1.20%)	2 (0.80%)	2 (2.20%)
Baptist	2 (0.60%)	1 (0.40%)	1 (1.10%)
Lutheran	2 (0.60%)	1 (0.40%)	1 (1.10%)
Other protestant	1 (0.30%)	–	1 (1.10%)
Conservative Judaism	1 (0.30%)	1 (0.40%)	–
Buddhism	3 (0.90%)	1 (0.40%)	2 (2.20%)
Islam	1 (0.30%)	1 (0.40%)	–
New Age	1 (0.30%)	1 (0.40%)	–
Atheism	97 (29.00%)	72 (29.80%)	25 (26.90%)
Agnosticism	67 (20.00%)	48 (19.80%)	19 (20.40%)
Other	8 (2.40%)	4 (1.70%)	4 (4.30%)
Psychological variables
	M (SD)	M (SD)	M (SD)
Prayer
Adoration	1.77 (1.38)	1.78 (1.37)	1.73 (1.40)	p = .773
Confession	1.72 (1.28)	1.71 (1.29)	1.73 (1.27)	p = .914
Thanksgiving	1.89 (1.40)	1.87 (1.36)	1.94 (1.51)	p = .686
Supplication	1.94 (1.48)	1.93 (1.47)	1.99 (1.53)	p = .725
Reception	1.84 (1.29)	1.80 (1.22)	1.96 (1.46)	p = .292
Religious participation	1.67 (1.14)	1.68 (1.15)	1.64 (1.12)	p = .795
Anxiety	2.44 (0.89)	2.43 (0.88)	2.47 (0.92)	p = .756
Depression	2.40 (0.90)	2.38 (0.90)	2.44 (0.89)	p = .593
Emotional well-being	3.39 (1.20)	3.39 (1.25)	3.42 (1.07)	p = .840
Psychological well-being	3.58 (1.25)	3.57 (1.26)	3.61 (1.121	p = .790

Measures

Anxiety and depression

Anxiety and depression were assessed at T1 and T2 using the Polish version of the Patient Health Questionnaire-4 (PHQ-4; Kroenke et al. 2009) (the Polish translation is available at https://www.phqscreeners.com/select-screener). The PHQ-4 consists of two items assessing anxiety (e.g. ‘Feeling nervous, anxious or on edge’) and two items assessing depression (e.g. ‘Little interest or pleasure in doing things’) over the past two weeks. Participants rated items on a four-point Likert scale ranging from 0 (not at all) to 3 (almost every day). The internal consistency with McDonald’s omega at T1 and T2 and test-retest stability are provided in Table 2.

Table 2. Descriptive Statistics of major study variables at time 1 and time 2.

Variable	McDonald ω	Test-retest stability	Total sample NT1 = 355 NT2 = 242	Religious followers NT1 = 171 NT2 = 122	Nonreligious followers NT1 = 164 NT2 = 120	F	η^2
Prayer			M (SD)	M (SD)	M (SD)
Adoration	.97 .95	.76***	1.77 (1.38) 1.77 (1.40)	2.45 (1.63) 2.45 (1.66)	1.05 (0.32) 1.06 (0.37)	118.04*** 83.64***	.26 .26
Confession	.96 .93	.73***	1.72 (1.28) 1.73 (1.26)	2.37 (1.52) 2.38 (1.47)	1.03 (0.19) 1.08 (0.42)	125.74*** 86.46***	.27 .27
Thanksgiving	.94 .90	.72***	1.89 (1.40) 1.87 (1.37)	2.59 (1.54) 2.63 (1.53)	1.16 (0.72) 1.10 (0.49)	117.60*** 109.41***	.26 .31
Supplication	.93 .92	.70***	1.94 (1.48) 1.92 (1.46)	2.72 (1.61) 2.73 (1.64)	1.14 (0.71) 1.09 (0.49)	133.01*** 109.34***	.29 .31
Reception	.90 .82	.67***	1.84 (1.29) 1.83 (1.35)	2.47 (1.40) 2.52 (1.53)	1.19 (0.75) 1.12 (0.57)	108.64*** 88.59***	.25 .27
Religious participation	– –	.93***	1.67 (1.14) 1.63 (1.10)	2.28 (1.34) 2.23 (1.29)	1.02 (0.16) 1.04 (0.22)	144.69*** 97.56***	.31 .30
Anxiety	.87 .86	.54***	2.44 (0.89) 2.35 (0.94)	2.47 (0.89) 2.44 (1.02)	2.42 (0.89) 2.25 (0.84)	0.26 2.56	.00 .01
Depression	.85 .86	.51***	2.40 (0.90) 2.31 (0.96)	2.42 (0.88) 2.40 (1.05)	2.38 (0.92) 2.21 (0.87)	0.12 2.44	.00 .01
Emotional well-being	.91 .93	.69***	3.40 (1.20) 3.50 (1.27)	3.42 (1.24) 3.53 (1.33)	3.38 (1.16) 3.46 (1.21)	0.11 0.18	.00 .00
Psychological well-being	.91 .92	.73***	3.58 (1.25) 3.52 (1.29)	3.62 (1.23) 3.54 (1.32)	3.55 (1.26) 3.51 (1.27)	0.30 0.04	.00 .00

Note. The top rows contain the results from Time 1 (T1), while the bottom rows contain the results from Time 2 (T2).

***p < .001.

Emotional and psychological well-being

Emotional and psychological well-being were assessed using the Polish adaptation (Karaś, Cieciuch, and Keyes 2014) of the 14-item Mental Health Continuum – Short Form (MHC – SF; Keyes 2002). Emotional well-being was assessed using three items (‘happy’, ‘interested in life’, ‘satisfied with your life’), and psychological well-being was assessed using six items (‘that you liked most parts of your personality’, ‘good at managing the responsibilities of your daily life’, ‘that you had warm and trusting relationships with others?’, ‘that you had experiences that challenged you to grow and become a better person?’, ‘confident to think or express your own ideas and opinions?’, ‘that your life has a sense of direction or meaning to it?’). All the items were rated on a five-point scale ranging from 0 (never) to 5 (every day). The internal consistency with McDonald’s omega at T1 and T2 and test-retest stability are provided in Table 2.

Prayer

Five types of prayer were measured using the 21-item Multidimensional Prayer Inventory (MPI) (Laird et al. 2004) in its Polish adaptation (Zarzycka et al. 2022). We used Items 4–18, which assess five forms of prayer in the last month, i.e. adoration, confession, thanksgiving, supplication, and reception, which are rated on a 7-point Likert scale from 1 (never) to 7 (all of the time). Participants were informed that they could substitute the word ‘God’ with another phrase that they use to refer to the divine, such as ‘Higher Power’, etc. The completion of the MPI was not obligatory for participants. Participants were instructed at T1 and T2 to refer to the prayer items in regard to singlehood, that is, to consider the MPI items in reference to their single status. Participants were asked, as in the original instruction of the MPI, to report their experiences concerning prayer in the last month. Example items for the types of prayer include ‘I praised God’ (Adoration), ‘I admitted inappropriate thoughts, feelings, and behaviors’ (Confession), ‘I offered thanks for specific things’ (Thanksgiving), ‘I made various requests of God’ (Supplication) and ‘I opened myself up to God for insight into my problems’ (Reception). The internal consistency with McDonald’s omega at T1 and T2 and test-retest stability are provided in Table 2.

Demographic information

Respondents were asked to indicate their age, the gender they identify with the most, their place of residence, their highest educational level, whether they have a partner/spouse, the form of this relationship, their nationality and the religion they follow, with the option to indicate that they do not follow any religion.

Data analyses

The descriptive statistics, test-retest stability, internal consistency, and a series of paired t tests assessing the changes in the variables between T1 and T2 were determined by SPSS 27.0. The substantial moderation analyses were performed using the macro MEMORE version 2.1 (Montoya 2019) in SPSS 27.0. This is a macro that allows estimating mediation and moderation models for two-instance within-subjects/repeated measures designs (Montoya 2019). We performed five separate analyses to test moderation models for each type of prayer concerning singlehood and each variable related to mental health. To determine the role of prayer in single adults’ mental health taking into account religious identity (i.e. being religious or not religious followers), we performed separate moderation analyses for single religious and nonreligious followers.

Results

Preliminary analyses

First, the descriptive statistics, internal consistency, and test-retest stability were determined (see Table 2). Table 2 also displays the results of the mean-level comparisons for the major study variables between religious and nonreligious followers. These analyses demonstrated significant systematic, although moderate in magnitude, differences in five types of prayer concerning singlehood and service participation between religious and nonreligious followers. To be precise, religious followers reported higher levels of five types of prayer concerning singlehood and service participation than nonreligious followers. At the same time, religious and nonreligious followers did not differ in regard to any of the indicators of mental health.

In addition, drawing from past studies (e.g. Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023; Zarzycka and Krok 2021) that showed the skewed distribution of prayer measured by employment of the Multidimensional Prayer Inventory (MPI) (Laird et al. 2004), we also assessed the kurtosis and skewness values of prayer as well as four indicators of mental health (see Table S1 in the online supplementary materials). The analyses revealed that all the variables, including prayer, had nonnormal distributions.

Second, a series of paired t tests assessing the changes in the major study variables between T1 and T2 were performed and demonstrated no changes in the mean levels of variables between T1 and T2 in the course of six months (see Table 3).

Table 3. Differences in five forms of prayer, anxiety, depression, emotional and psychological well-being between time 1 and time 2.

	Time 1		Time 2
	M	SD	M	SD	t (df)	p-value	Cohen’s d
Adoration	1.78	1.37	1.77	1.40	0.11 (241)	.911	.01
Confession	1.71	1.29	1.73	1.26	−.037 (241)	.714	−.02
Thanksgiving	1.87	1.36	1.87	1.37	0.00 (241)	1.00	.00
Supplication	1.93	1.47	1.92	1.46	0.11 (241)	.910	.01
Reception	1.80	1.22	1.83	1.35	−0.41 (241)	.684	−.03
Anxiety	2.43	0.94	2.35	0.90	1.54 (241)	.124	.10
Depression	2.38	0.90	2.31	0.96	1.29 (241)	.200	.08
Emotional well-being	3.39	1.25	3.50	1.27	−1.70 (241)	.091	−.11
Psychological well-being	3.57	1.26	3.52	1.29	0.83 (241)	.406	.05

Note. N = 242. p-value (two-tailed).

Finally, the bivariate correlations between variables were calculated separately in a sample of religious and nonreligious followers (see Tables S2 and S3 in the online supplementary materials). Regardless of whether the sample was of religious or nonreligious followers, the correlations between the five types of prayer concerning singlehood were moderate and strong in magnitude and ranged from r = .37 (confession × supplication at T1 for nonreligious followers) to r = .89 (e.g. thanksgiving × confession at T2 for nonreligious followers). For religious followers, the significant correlations between five types of prayer concerning singlehood and mental health outcomes ranged from r = .17 (depression × supplication) to r = .34 (emotional well-being × thanksgiving) at T1 and from r = −.22 (emotional well-being × supplication) to r = .28 (depression × supplication) at T2. In turn, for nonreligious followers, the correlations ranged from r = .17 (psychological well-being × confession) to r = .23 (emotional well-being × thanksgiving) at T1 and from r = .18 (e.g. psychological well-being ×thanksgiving) to r = .24 (psychological well-being × reception) at T2. The significant correlations between different types of mental health outcomes were similar across religious and nonreligious followers and measurement time.

Moderation analyses

Regarding that in the preliminary steps of analyses we determined, as in other studies (e.g. Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023; Zarzycka and Krok 2021), nonnormal distributions of all prayer variables (see Table S1 in the online supplemental materials), we decided to follow a similar solution to that applied by Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash (2023). To be precise, analogically, as Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash (2023) examined the associations between prayer types and well-being, due to the skewed distribution of the prayer variable, we created a dichotomous prayer frequency variable (coded as 0 = did not pray a given type of prayer, 1 = prayed a given type of prayer). We entered this variable in the moderation analyses performed separately for the samples of religious and nonreligious followers.

The results of moderation analyses stratified by being religious and nonreligious followers are presented in Tables 4 and 5 and in Figure 1.

Figure 1. Prayer as a moderator in changes in emotional and psychological well being and anxiety between time and time 2 in samples of single religious and nonreligious followers.

Note. Figures A,B,C and D present the results for religious followers, whereas Figure E presents the results for nonreligious followers.

Table 4. Prayer as a moderator in changes in anxiety, depression, emotional and psychological well-being between time 1 and time 2 in a sample of single religious followers.

	Anxiety				Depression				Emotional well-being				Psychological well-being
Types of prayer	F	R^2	B	t (df = 120)	F	R^2	B	t (df = 120)	F	R^2	B	t (df = 120)	F	R^2	B	t (df = 120)
Adoration	0.78	.01	0.15	0.88	0.06	.01	−0.04	−0.25	1.48	.01	0.23	1.22	1.28	.01	0.21	1.13
Confession	0.02	.01	0.02	0.13	0.01	.00	0.01	0.06	5.96*	.05*	0.45*	2.44*	6.45*	.05*	0.46*	2.54*
Thanksgiving	0.23	.01	0.08	0.48	0.01	.00	0.01	.08	4.73*	.04*	0.43*	2.17*	3.78	.03	0.37	1.94
Supplication	1.12	.01	0.19	1.06	0.02	.01	−0.03	−.15	3.65	.03	0.38	1.91	3.17	.03	0.35	1.78
Reception	0.23	.02	0.08	0.48	0.09	.01	0.05	.30	4.16*	.03*	0.40*	2.04*	3.27	.03	0.35	1.81

Note. N = 171 at Time 1. N = 122 at Time 2.

*p < .05.

Table 5. Prayer as a moderator in changes in anxiety, depression, emotional and psychological well-being between time 1 and time 2 in a sample of single nonreligious followers.

	Anxiety				Depression				Emotional well-being				Psychological well-being
Types of prayer	F	R^2	β	t (df = 118)	F	R^2	β	t (df = 118)	F	R^2	β	t (df = 118)	F	R^2	β	t (df = 118)
Adoration	6.04*	.05*	−1.21*	−2.46*	3.26	.03	−1.02	−1.81	.15	.01	−0.22	−.39	.40	.01	0.33	.64
Confession	3.11	.03	−0.63	−1.76	.70	.01	−0.34	.84	.96	.09	−0.40	−.98	.19	.01	−0.16	−.44
Thanksgiving	1.59	.01	−0.40	−1.26	.23	.01	−0.17	−.48	.16	.01	−0.14	−.40	.12	.03	−0.11	−.35
Supplication	3.34	.03	−0.71	−1.83	1.73	.01	−0.58	−1.32	.12	.01	−0.16	−.35	.01	.01	−0.03	−.07
Reception	1.76	.01	−0.34	−1.33	.19	.01	0.12	.43	.89	.01	−0.27	−.94	.15	.01	−0.10	−.38

Note. N = 164 at Time 1. N = 120 at Time 2.

*p < .05.

As Table 4 displays, in a sample of single religious followers, none of the five types of prayer concerning singlehood were found to moderate the changes in the negative indicators of mental health, that is, anxiety and depression, over the course of six months.

In regard to emotional well-being, three types of prayer concerning singlehood, namely, confession, thanksgiving and reception, were found to moderate the changes in emotional well-being between T1 and T2 within six months (see Table 4 and Figure 1). To be precise, single people who prayed confession (n = 74), thanksgiving (n = 84) and reception (n = 84) did not experience any changes in emotional well-being, whereas single people who did not pray confession (n = 48), thanksgiving (n = 38) and reception (n = 38) experienced an increase in emotional well-being.

In regard to psychological well-being, confession prayer concerning singlehood was determined to moderate the changes in psychological well-being between T1 and T2 (see Table 4 and Figure 1). Specifically, single individuals who prayed confession (n = 74) experienced a decrease in psychological well-being over six months, whereas individuals who did not perform confession prayer (n = 48) did not report any changes in psychological well-being.

Finally, in a sample of single nonreligious followers, we found that four types of prayer concerning singlehood did not moderate the changes in any of the indicators of mental health, with the exception of adoration, which moderated the changes in anxiety (see Table 5 and Figure 1). To be precise, single individuals who performed adoration prayer (n = 3) did not experience any changes in anxiety between T1 and T2, whereas single individuals who did not perform adoration prayer (n = 117) experienced a decrease in the level of anxiety. However, it should be noted that only three nonreligious followers performed adoration prayer.

Discussion

By employing a study with a longitudinal design and two assessments over the course of six months that used samples consisting of individuals of various religious affiliations and generally representing religious and nonreligious followers, the present investigation bridged an important gap in the literature by examining the temporal role of a multifaceted construct of prayer (adoration, confession, thanksgiving, supplication, and reception; Laird et al. 2004) concerning singlehood in the mental health (measured in terms of anxiety, depression, emotional and psychological well-being) of single adults.

Our findings uniquely pertaining to single adults support the claim made by Speed and Hwang (2019) that ‘prayer has a nuanced relationship with well-being, rather than a monolithic one’ (p. 304) and that ‘(…) the relationship that prayer has with wellbeing is not intrinsically salutary or deleterious; it is contingent on, among other things, theistic belief and religious affiliation’ (p. 304). Our investigation also enhanced the notion that prayer is a multifaceted construct (e.g. Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023) and unveiled the differentiated role of the selected prayers concerning singlehood for various indicators of single individuals’ mental health depending on the participants’ declaration of whether or not they are religious followers.

Our analyses revealed that in a sample of single adults who were religious followers, none of the types of prayer concerning singlehood were related to changes in negative indicators of mental health measured in terms of anxiety and depression. These findings, therefore, support past studies that revealed the lack of associations between prayer and depression (see Bradshaw, Ellison, and Flannelly 2008; Zarzycka et al. 2022). At the same time, our results contradict studies that demonstrated links between a higher frequency of prayer and lower trait anxiety (Maltby, Lewis, and Day 1999) and anxiety symptoms (Ellison et al. 2014) and between supplication and reception prayers and higher anxiety (Zarzycka et al. 2022). Our results suggest that prayer concerning singlehood may not be related to changes in negative indicators of mental health and may not attenuate or enhance the symptoms of depression and anxiety, at least in the specific context of singlehood.

Furthermore, in the sample of religious followers, we observed significant links between the selected types of prayer concerning singlehood and emotional and psychological well-being. To be precise, confession, thanksgiving and reception prayer concerning singlehood was related to increased emotional well-being, but only among those who did not pray. This means that individuals who did not acknowledge their faults, misdeeds, or shortcomings and requested forgiveness (confession), did not express gratitude to God for singlehood (thanksgiving), and did not passively await divine wisdom, understanding, or guidance (reception) experienced an increase in emotional well-being over six months. In turn, confession prayer concerning singlehood was related to decreased psychological well-being among those who prayed. In other words, individuals who acknowledged their faults, misdeeds, or shortcomings and requested forgiveness reported a decrease in psychological well-being over six months.

The above pattern of results unveils and confirms the complex and inconsistent associations between prayer concerning singlehood and mental health also revealed in previous studies (see Masters and Spielmans 2007, for a review; McCullough 1995; Zarzycka et al. 2022). On the one hand, our findings contradict previous studies showing that prayer can be related to better mental health outcomes (Bradshaw and Kent 2018), be an effective strategy in coping with personal problems (Parks-Stamm, Pollack, and Hill 2020), or lead to personal and interpersonal emotional benefits (McCulloch and Parks-Stamm 2020). Previous studies have also shown positive links between adoration, thanksgiving, and reception prayer and subjective well-being, self-esteem, optimism, and a feeling of having meaning in life (e.g. Whittington and Scher 2010; You and Yoo 2016) and a positive impact of prayer on psychological well-being (e.g. Laird et al. 2004; Puchalska-Wasyl and Zarzycka 2020; Zarzycka et al. 2022). Our findings also do not corroborate the recent results obtained by Newman et al. (2023), who found that thanksgiving (and adoration) prayer negatively affected well-being on the following day, but these effects were attenuated or reversed among individuals who prayed every day. Our findings appear to provide evidence for another line of studies that demonstrated negative associations between prayer and mental health and positive associations between prayer and indicators of distress (e.g. Bradshaw, Ellison, and Flannelly 2008, 2018; Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023).

Our results can be considered congruent with two notions in past studies attempting to explain the negative links between prayer frequency and health outcomes. For instance, Masters and Spielmans (2007) noted that (a) people are more likely seek divine comfort and help to cope with an illness or even to hope for healing. Indeed, prayer is likely to occur when people experience severe negative events or when they feel that other forms of coping are ineffective as a response to long-term negative events (see Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023). (b) People who pray in times of stress may, during prayer, more strongly concentrate on the experienced difficulties than on their management, which leads to employment passive or less healthy strategies. In addition, prayer has also been considered to contribute to external attributions that lead to greater salience of negative experiences and unfulfilled expectations (Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash (2023)). Moreover, Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash (2023) indicated that in regard to prayer, we can also consider the ironic effect that may be connected to ritualistic behaviours, meaning that rituals may bring an immediate reduction in anxiety, but in the long-term perspective, they may lead to negative consequences (e.g. intrusive thoughts) (Boyer and Liénard 2006).

Translating the above notions to the role of prayer concerning singlehood in single individuals’ mental health, it may be plausible that the positive link between not praying and increased emotional well-being results from the possibility that single individuals who did not pray did not experience singlehood as a severely negative and stressful event and thus, did not seek divine comfort and help to cope with singlehood or did not consider other forms of coping with singlehood as ineffective. Therefore, even if these individuals experienced singlehood in negative terms, they did not pray but also experienced greater emotional well-being as a function of single status over the course of six months. Moreover, if these individuals did not pray, they may not have concentrated on the difficulties of remaining single but rather searched for more active coping strategies. As a result, from a long-term perspective, non-praying individuals avoided the negative effects related to prayer, which contributed to an increase in their emotional well-being.

In the current investigation, we also observed that single individuals who performed confession prayer concerning singlehood experienced a decrease in psychological well-being. These findings provide evidence for past studies that revealed the negative links between confession, supplication, and obligation prayers and positive indicators of well-being (Whittington and Scher 2010; You and Yoo 2016). For instance, Whittington and Scher (2010) found that confession was the most consistent negative predictor of subjective well-being, self-esteem, and optimism. These authors also suggested that prayers in which individuals desire to receive something from God (forgiveness in the case of confession) and are characterised by strong self‐focusing on individuals’ actions (shortcomings and sins in the case of confession) may have a negative effect on well-being (Whittington and Scher 2010).

Single individuals who performed confession prayer concerning singlehood might have also experienced the ironic effect demonstrated in regard to ritualistic behaviours (Boyer and Liénard 2006), which means that prayer might have positive effects on single people’s psychological well-being, but in a longer perspective, which was captured in the current investigation, confession prayer may have entailed negative consequences in the form of reduced psychological well-being. Furthermore, since prayer may reflect an individual’s belief that prayer is ‘the best way to solve both worldly and personal problems’ (Froese and Uecker 2022, 674), such a firmly held belief may jeopardise one’s striving to achieve optimal psychological well-being.

Our finding implying the negative link between prayer concerning singlehood and psychological well-being appears to corroborate the notions formulated by Himawan et al. (2018a) that religion may also play a maladaptive role for single individuals. In particular, religiosity can lead to negative religious coping, concentrating more on religion than on single status or disregarding religion as a source of meaning in life. In addition, the negative role of confession in psychological well-being appears to confirm the notion that in stressful and difficult situations (and single status may be a source of stress; Jackson 2018), people tend to rely on meaning systems (Park 2013), and for many individuals, religion may be an essential foundation for their meaning systems determining how they interpret their experiences (Zarzycka, Tychmanowicz, and Krok 2020), including the experience of singlehood.

Finally, in a sample of single adults who were not religious followers, we determined that four types of prayer concerning singlehood did not moderate the changes in anxiety, depression, emotional and psychological well-being over the course of six months, with the exception of the link between adoration and anxiety. Our results suggest that nonreligious followers who did not perform adoration prayer concerning singlehood experienced a benefit in terms of decreased anxiety. Past literature has suggested that even if people are not affiliated with any religion, they may occasionally pray (Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023) and may particularly tend to pray in times of need (Mrdjenovich 2019; Murray et al. 2004). Furthermore, previous studies have also demonstrated the positive links of adoration prayer with well-being (e.g. Whittington and Scher 2010; You and Yoo 2016), but Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash (2023) recently also found that present-day adoration prayer negatively predicted well-being the following day; however, this effect was weaker among persons who prayed more frequently.

Adoration is a type of prayer that involves the pure praise and worship of God without reference to specific events or needs (Laird et al. 2004; Newman, Nezlek, and Thrash 2023). Thus, if nonreligious followers refrain from adoration and do not praise and worship God, they do not confront the issue of religion or God and experience lower anxiety. However, it is important to note that only three nonreligious persons performed adoration prayer compared to 117 people who did not perform adoration prayer. Therefore, the finding pertaining to the link between adoration prayer and anxiety should be interpreted very cautiously. In connection with this notion, it is important to bear in mind that in general, a very small number of nonreligious individuals prayed a given prayer concerning singlehood compared to the majority of nonreligious people who did not pray.

Limitations and future directions

It is important to emphasise that several limitations must be taken into account when considering the results. First, participants were recruited via Facebook, and users are less likely to identify their religious views on Facebook (Davidson and Farquhar 2014). Second, the present investigation relied on the Laird et al. (2004) typology of prayer, which clearly and easily distinguishes five types of prayer (Lazar 2014). However, future research would benefit from employing other more psychologically oriented prayer models (Lazar 2014) and would benefit from the inclusion of the various dimensions of prayer (e.g. the purpose of prayer, prayer target, the emotional state during prayer) that have been recently indicated as broadening the understanding of prayer practices (see Froese and Uecker 2022).

Third, the current investigation was performed in a specific religious and marital context of Poland, which is characterised by a high rate of individuals (approximately 90%) declaring their belonging to the Catholic Church (Żemojtel-Piotrowska, Piotrowski, and Sawicki 2021) and firm adherence to traditional marriage (Janicka and Szymczak 2019). Fourth, future research could examine the mechanism by which prayer affects single individuals’ well-being, for instance, by including the construct of psychological perspective and emotional acceptance and employing experimental designs (see McCulloch and Parks-Stamm, 2020). Finally, in future studies, it could be beneficial to use naturalistic daily diary methods to gain insights into the daily events and experiences that may influence prayer content and how prayer may influence fluctuating states of mental health of single individuals.

Conclusion

Using the longitudinal design of the current investigation, we gained insights into the temporal role of prayer concerning singlehood in single individuals’ mental health. Among single religious individuals, prayer concerning singlehood was not related to changes in anxiety and depression; however, in the group of religious followers, confession, reception and thanksgiving prayer concerning singlehood were related to increased emotional well-being among those who did not pray; confession and thanksgiving were related to decreased psychological well-being among those who prayed. In turn, among single nonreligious individuals, none of the five types of prayer concerning singlehood were related to changes in mental health over six months. We hope that these initial findings on the link between prayer concerning singlehood and single adults’ mental health inspire more research into how prayer and religion affect single individuals’ well-being and their coping or thriving and what the mechanisms behind these associations are.

Ethical approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with APA ethical standards and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. The research was positively evaluated by the Ethics Committee for Research with the People as Study Participants at the Faculty of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, Poland (Decision number: 2/07/2020).

Authors’ contribution statements

Conceptualisation: Katarzyna Adamczyk; Methodology: Katarzyna Adamczyk; Formal analysis and investigation: Katarzyna Adamczyk, Agnieszka E. Łyś, Radosław Trepanowski, Wojciech Rogowski; Writing – original draft preparation: Katarzyna Adamczyk, Agnieszka E. Łyś, Wojciech Rogowski; Writing – review and editing: Katarzyna Adamczyk, Agnieszka E. Łyś; Funding acquisition: Katarzyna Adamczyk, Wojciech Rogowski; Resources: Katarzyna Adamczyk, Agnieszka E. Łyś, Radosław Trepanowski, Wojciech Rogowski; Supervision: Katarzyna Adamczyk.

Disclosure statement

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

Data availability statement

The dataset generated and analysed in the study is publicly available on the Open Science Framework at https://osf.io/3kv6h/?view_only=4848a7ba754b4ea98d0832a1723e1c16.

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/13617672.2024.2359788

Additional information

Funding

The research leading to these results received funding from National Science Centre, Poland, awarded to Katarzyna Adamczyk under grant agreement no. [UMO-2019/34/E/HS6/00164] and Adam Mickiewicz University’s programme “Excellence Initiative - Research University” [study@research project no. 033/39/UAM/0012] awarded to Wojciech Rogowski.

Notes on contributors

Katarzyna Adamczyk

Katarzyna Adamczyk is an Associate Professor of Psychology and a Chair of the Singlehood Research Laboratory (SingleLab) at the Faculty of Psychology and Cognitive Science at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań. Currently, she investigates what role religion and spirituality play in the lives of single individuals.

Radosław Trepanowski

Radosław Trepanowski is a PhD student at the Doctoral School at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań. He also holds a fellowship under the grant UMO-2019/34/E/HS6/00164 funded by the National Science Centre, Poland. He is a member of the Singlehood Research Laboratory (SingleLab) at the Faculty of Psychology and Cognitive Science at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań.

Agnieszka Ewa Łyś

Agnieszka Ewa Łyś is a psychologist and a postdoctoral researcher at the Faculty of Psychology and Cognitive Science at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań. Her research interests focus on gender-based violence and the sociocultural aspects of sexuality, particularly the stereotypes and prejudices concerning relationships and sexuality, for instance, rape myths, rape victim blaming, stereotypes about singlehood, and consensual non-monogamy.

Wojciech Rogowski

Wojciech Rogowski is a psychology student at the Faculty of Psychology and Cognitive Science at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań. His interests involve intimate relationships, cross-cultural psychology, the psychology of religion, and data science.