Aspects of religious and spiritual meaning systems in late life psychological functioning

Religion and spirituality still are an important part of life for many people and as such function as a framework – the so-called meaning system – from which individuals perceive, interpret and adapt to the world (Reker & Wong, 1988; Silberman, 2005). Especially in late adulthood, religion and spirituality may provide direction and support for dealing with the challenges of later life. Studying religion and spirituality as part of an older adult’s meaning system is important, not only because of the heightened significance of religion and spirituality in late adulthood (Wink & Dillon, 2002), but also because it is considered to be positively associated with well-being and health (Miller & Thoresen, 2003; Weber & Pargament, 2014). Therefore, the present dissertation focuses on specific aspects of religious and spiritual meaning systems in relation to late life psychological functioning.

More specific, a large scale longitudinal study was set up to investigate two aspects of religious meaning system, i.e., religious doubt and insecure attachment to God, in relation to the experience of depressive symptoms among nursing home residents. The occurrence of depressive symptoms and depression is a well-known problem among institutionalized older adults, making it a valuable indicator of late life psychological functioning when examined in relation to religious meaning systems. To improve our insight of spiritual meaning systems in relation to late life psychological functioning, data from a cross-sectional study on community dwelling older adults was used to examine the unique relation of each spirituality dimension with psychological well-being. Lastly, to include the voice of the older adults themselves regarding their perspective of the experience of spirituality, in-depth interviews were conducted to uncover the essence of the experience of spirituality in late life within a nursing home context.

In sum, by using both cross-sectional and longitudinal data as well as qualitative data, the present dissertation managed to show from different perspectives how religion and spirituality, as part of older adult’s meaning system, are related to psychological functioning in late adulthood. It turned out that (1) religion and spirituality constitute indeed an important of the meaning system of religious and spiritual older adults; (2) older adults’ experience of religion and spirituality cannot be seen independently of the developmental phase of late adulthood; and (3) older adults’ psychological functioning has an impact on their religious and spiritual meaning systems.