Incorporating spiritual beliefs into a cognitive model of worry

Abstract

Cognitive theory and research have traditionally highlighted the relevance of the core beliefs about oneself, the world, and the future to human emotions. For some individuals, however, core beliefs may also explicitly involve spiritual themes. In this article, we propose a cognitive model of worry, in which positive/negative beliefs about the Divine affect symptoms through the mechanism of intolerance of uncertainty. Using mediation analyses, we found support for our model across two studies, in particular, with regards to negative spiritual beliefs. These findings highlight the importance of assessing for spiritual alongside secular convictions when creating cognitive-behavioral case formulations in the treatment of religious individuals.

Use of the correlation coefficient in agricultural sciences: problems, pitfalls and how to deal with them

“…One can use partial correlations to establish such pathways, but this can be a very laborious process in the absence of prior intuition about the variables and a descriptive approach would be better. In fact, partial correlations are seldom encountered in agricultural applications (for an example see Lorentz et al 2011), the opposite being the case in psychology (e.g., Rosmarin et al 2011).…”

Intolerance of uncertainty moderates the relations among religiosity and motives for religion, depression, and social evaluation fears

“…Religion may be particularly resourceful to persons who experience great distress and avoidance when faced with uncertainty. For example, Rosmarin et al () found that among Christian and Jewish participants, IU mediated the relations between trust and mistrust in a higher power and symptoms of worry. Overall, religion guides cognition and behavior for many individuals and can be a meaningful resource for coping with adversity (e.g., Pargament, ; Weber & Pargament, , for a review).…”

Avoidance Behavior Following Terror Event Exposure: Effects of Perceived Life Threat and Jewish Religious Coping

“…Some authors have suggested that negative religious coping may reduce trust in G‐d and increase intolerance toward uncertainty, and thus raise worry and awareness to possible threatening aspects of the surroundings (Rosmarin et al. ). Hypotheses that were derived from TMT postulates that undermining of religious schemas leads to weakening of meaning‐related psychological structures, and that this results in increased awareness to life threat and death‐related thought (Friedman and Rholes ).…”

“…However, the effect of spiritual beliefs on the response to traumatic event exposure has been somewhat neglected, though some authors have stressed the role of spiritual and religious themes in mental health (Rosmarin et al. ). Recently, religious cognitive behavioral therapy (RCBT) has been examined for major depression in persons with chronic medical illness (Koenig et al.…”

“…), and was also postulated to affect cognitive factors, such as elevating a mistrust in G‐d, the latter leading to increased levels of worry and stress (Rosmarin et al. ). Studying the effects of religious coping after traumatic event exposure may have important implications for treatment and intervention among traumatized individuals; cognitive therapies after trauma often focus on restructuring of negative cognitions about the self, others, and the world (Resick, Monson, and Chard ).…”