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Updated: Jun 13, 2026

Design and Implementation of an fMRI Study Examining Thought Suppression in Young Women with, and At-risk, for Depression
Published on: May 19, 2015
Unforgiveness, rumination, and depressive symptoms among older adults
Berit Ingersoll-Dayton1, Cynthia Torges, Neal Krause
1School of Social Work, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA. bid@umich.edu
Abstract:
The experience of feeling unforgiven for past transgressions may contribute to depressive symptoms in later life. This article tests a model in which feeling unforgiven by God and by other people have direct effects on depressive symptoms while self-unforgiveness and rumination mediate this relationship. The sample consisted of 965 men and women aged 67 and older who participated in a national probability sample survey, the Religion, Aging, and Health survey. Results from a latent variable model indicate that unforgiveness by others has a significant direct effect on depressive symptoms and an indirect effect via self-unforgiveness and rumination. However, rather than having a direct effect on depressive symptoms, unforgiveness by God operates only indirectly through self-unforgiveness and rumination. Similarly, self-unforgiveness has an indirect effect on depressive symptoms through rumination.
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