Spiritual well-being after trauma: Correlates with appraisals, coping, and psychological adjustment

Spiritual issues are often implicated in trauma, yet little research has examined the specific pathways through which trauma may affect spiritual well-being or relations between spiritual well-being and other aspects of adjustment following trauma. Such information would be helpful in developing psychological interventions for trauma recovery. In a sample of 436 college students who had survived a traumatic experience, a transactional stress and coping perspective were used to examine both predictors of three components of spiritual well-being (faith, meaning, and peace) and relations between spiritual well-being and other aspects of psychological adjustment. Results suggest that different patterns of appraisals and coping predict each component of spiritual well-being and that all three components-particularly those of meaning and peace-are related to psychological adjustment. These results suggest that spiritual well-being is an important posttraumatic outcome warranting future research and clinical attention.