1998/06/01 by Ann F. Pritt · 1 citation
Social Sciences · Psychology · Health Professions · Medicine · #Religion, Spirituality, and Psychology #Grief, Bereavement, and Mental Health #Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health #Sexual abuse #Pessimism #Psychology #Optimism #Clinical psychology #Suicide prevention #Poison control #Medicine #Theology #Social psychology
paper · doi:10.2307/1387527
openalex publication_date 1998/06/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2025/11/06
Although many studies of physical emotional, and social effects of sexual abuse have been conauctea, spiritual effects have received little attention. Using Mormon women (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints), who had received counseling. This exploratory study compared 115 women who reported having been sexually abused as children with 70 who reported no such abuse. The questionnaire probed their concept of God, measured by Gorsuch and Spilka's Adjective Scales, sense of spiritual well-being, measuread by Paloutzian and Ellison's Spiritual Well-Being Scale (SWBS), and overall optimism or pessimism, measured by Seligman's Attributional Style Questionnaire (ASQ) In all three areas, the sexually abused group's scores were significantly more negative than were the scores of the nonabused group. This strongly suggests the relevance of spiritual issues in the treatment of survivors of child sexual abuse.