The Role of Forgiveness and Self-Esteem in the Explanation of Well-Being

Abstract

The tendency to focus on people's physical and emotional well-being is now an important area of study in psychology. Well-being is one of the most important concepts in this field and stands out as a factor that makes an individual's life more satisfying and meaningful. In addition to well-being, forgiveness, and high self-esteem are associated with positive situations and experiences. Thus, it would be reasonable to investigate the relationship between these variables. The main aim of this study is to examine how forgiveness and self-esteem explain well-being. To this aim, a model was created, hypotheses were developed, and data were analyzed using multiple regression. The study was conducted with 505 (female=317, male=188) university students. The results of the study show that self-forgiveness significantly and positively explains self-esteem. In addition, self-forgiveness and self-esteem significantly and positively explain well-being. Self-forgiveness also significantly explains well-being through self-esteem. According to the other results, forgiving others explains well-being positively, and significantly, but not significantly by self-esteem. Future studies can test the hypotheses developed by including various psychological (narcissism, depression, empathy, perceived social support) and demographic (age, economic status, marital status) variables in the model.