Negative Life Events and Psychological Distress: The Mediating Role of Religious and Spiritual Struggles

Abstract

Negative Life Events (NLE) and Psychological Distress (PD) have been strongly linked by literature. Still, not everyone who experienced NLE develops PD. The role of religious and spiritual (R/S) struggles is underexplored, particularly in a more secular setting like the Netherlands. This study aimed to investigate whether R/S struggles, especially the subdimension ultimate meaning struggles, partially mediate the relationship between NLE and PD. Further, the study examined whether UM struggles were a stronger mediator of NLE and anxiety symptoms compared to stress or depressive symptoms. A cross-sectional questionnaire was filled out by a non-clinical sample of people living in the Netherlands (N=191). The survey included the List of Threatening Experiences (LTE) for assessing NLE, the Religious and Spiritual Struggles Scale (RSSS) for R/S struggles, and the DASS-21 to measure PD. Three separate mediation models tested the hypotheses using SPSS Process. The findings indicated a significant weak direct effect. Neither R/S struggles nor UM struggles partially mediated the link between NLE and PD, as NLE did not predict R/S nor UM struggles. UM struggles were strongly linked to all PD subscales, but the most to depression. Although no mediation was confirmed, the strong association found between both R/S struggles and UM struggles with PD showcases their clinical relevance, even in less religious populations. The results demonstrate the need to integrate R/S struggles in psychological assessment and therapy.