The invisible battle: A descriptive study of religious/spiritual struggles in Veterans

Open-Ended and Closed-Ended Measures of Religious/Spiritual Struggles: A Mixed-Methods Study

“…A total of 88% of r/s struggles in the current sample were categorized according to an RSS domain. This contrasts with the results from a sample of Veterans described in the introduction in which only 62% of r/s struggles were categorized according to an RSS domain (Breuninger et al 2019). This discrepancy is likely because a high proportion of Veterans described a mental health difficulty (without any mention of r/s issues explicitly) as an important r/s struggle, decreasing the percentage of struggles captured by an RSS domain.…”

“…Ultimate meaning struggles may be more commonly identified as salient r/s struggles in samples with lower levels of mental health. For example, among Veterans who were recruited from VA hospitals, 10% reported ultimate meaning struggles as being most salient (Breuninger et al 2019). Another reason for low prevalence in this sample is that questions of ultimate meaning may not be as relevant an issue for college students developmentally as issues around identity, explortation, and planning for the future (Arnett 2000).…”

“…In one mixed-methods study (Breuninger et al 2019), a sample of 178 veterans gave brief, written descriptions of r/s struggles that were coded into either one of the six RSS domains, an "other r/s struggle" category that did not fit with the RSS domains (e.g., not having time to devote to r/s), or a "non-r/s struggle" (e.g., health struggle with no r/s connotation). The prevalence for each domain was: moral (16% of participants), interpersonal (12%), doubt (11%), and ultimate meaning (10%), divine struggles (8%), demonic (5%), other r/s struggle (10%), and non-r/s struggle (28%).…”

“…We did not develop codes for demonic struggles because a very low proportion of responses (around 1%) seemed to touch on this domain. We previously noted a variety of reasons why demonic struggles may be uncommon in open-ended responses: Compared to other r/s struggle domains, demonic struggles may be less tangible, less amenable to logical understanding, and more stigmatized (Breuninger et al 2019). Future work attempting to assess open-ended descriptions of demonic struggles may need to prompt participants to report demonic struggle content.…”

Open-Ended Descriptions of Religious/Spiritual Struggles: Salient Themes and Associations with the Religious and Spiritual Struggles (RSS) Scale and Religiousness

“…In one study (Breuninger et al 2019), a sample of 178 veterans gave brief, written descriptions of r/s struggles that were coded into either one of the six RSS domains, an "other r/s struggle" category that did not fit with the RSS domains (e.g., not having time to devote to r/s), or a "non-r/s struggle" (e.g., health struggle with no r/s connotation). Prevalence for each domain was: moral (16% of participants), interpersonal (12%), doubt (11%), and ultimate meaning (10%), divine struggles (8%), demonic (5%), other r/s struggle (10%), and non-r/s struggle (28%).…”