This study aimed to expand the assessment of spiritual growth in the Posttraumatic Growth Inventory (PTGI) by developing additional spirituality items. Researchers administered a survey including the PTGI, eight new spiritual growth items, and the Centrality of Religiosity Scale (CRS) to 250 participants who had experienced a traumatic event. Correlational and regression analyses identified a five-item composite with good reliability and validity, including items related to private religious practice and spiritual experience in the CRS. The results support expanding the PTGI's measurement of spiritual growth with these new items.

1. Measuring Spirituality and Religiosity in Posttraumatic Growth
Alexis Brightman, Arnie Cann, Richard Tedeschi & Richard McAnulty
The University of North Carolina at Charlotte
METHOD
RESULTS
INTRODUCTION
REFERENCES
Participants
The current study seeks to identify a set of 5 items from the 10 spirituality
items that will broadly capture individuals’ experience of spiritual change.
Additionally, the goal was to assess which of the 10 spiritual change items
were most highly associated with intrinsic religiosity.
Cann, A., Calhoun, L., Tedeschi, R., Kilmer, R., Gil-Rivas, V., Vishnevsky, T., &
Danhauer, S., (2010). The Core Beliefs Inventory: a brief measure of disruption
in the assumptive world. Anxiety, Stress, & Coping, 23(1): 19-34.
Huber, S. & Huber, O., (2012) The Centrality of Religiosity Scale (CRS). Religions, 3:
710 -724.
Tedeschi, R.G., & Calhoun, L.G., (1996). The Posttraumatic Growth Inventory:
measuring the positive legacy of trauma. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 9(3): 455-471.
For additional information regarding posttraumatic growth, please contact us at
PosttraumaticGrowth@uncc.edu.
Correspondence concerning this poster should be addressed to Alexis Brightman, B.A.,
Department of Psychology, 9201 University City Blvd., Charlotte, NC 28223, United States.
E mail: abright6@uncc.edu .
The Posttraumatic Growth Inventory is a world-renowned measure in the
assessment of growth following a traumatic or stressful event. One dimension of
posttraumatic growth has been identified as Spiritual Growth, which is currently
being assessed by only two items within the PTGI. The current research aimed to
further develop the measure’s incremental validity, by enhancing the measure’s
ability to capture an individual’s spiritual or religious growth, as a result of the
event, while maintaining an acceptable length and avoiding survey fatigue. Five
items were identified as unsatisfactory predictors of the CRS domains, as well as
unfavorable correlates with the remaining five spiritual change items. Removal of
the five identified items increases the overall reliability of the Posttraumatic Growth
Inventory, as well as the Spiritual Growth subscale. As a result, five spiritual change
items have emerged as viable additions to the overall PTGI, increasing the
measure’s ability to adequately capture spiritual change and growth following a
traumatic event in the five designated domains.
The results indicated a consistently negative relationship between all of the
spirituality items and the CRS factor of Ideology, suggesting that those reporting
high in this factor may have established a secure foundation of religious beliefs,
thus not indicating a severe disturbance by the traumatic event. Ideology, which is a
more structured interpretation of religion, may inhibit growth because there is less
room for individual interpretations for traumatic events. Another potential
explanation, which was partly insinuated by Cann et al. (2010), may be that Ideology
might be negatively related to spiritual growth because people that are high in this
dimension already have a concrete foundation of religious beliefs that is not
severely disrupted by a traumatic event.
Correlational analyses and multiple regression analyses, with the 5 CRS factors as predictors of each
item, were conducted. The regression findings eliminated two items not related to the CRS factors.
Correlational and content analyses reduced the set of items to 5 by removing highly correlated items
with a similar theme and identifying items that were related to spiritual factors of the CRS (Private
Practice and Experience). The resulting five-item composite had good internal reliability (.92) and was
found to be positively correlated with an independent measure of spiritual change, satisfaction with life,
and found meaning in life. These results support the validity of the composite.
Posttraumatic Growth Inventory – Spiritual Items
Current Items
I have a better understanding of spiritual matters
I have a stronger religious faith
New Items
I have a greater sense of harmony with the world
I have greater clarity about life’s meaning
I feel more connected with all of existence
I have a greater sense that I am part of the fabric of life
I feel better able to face questions about life and death
I have a deeper sense of connection with the world
I have a better grasp of what life is all about
I feel more spiritually aware
Procedure
From a larger set of potential items, eight items were selected by a group of judges to be added to
the original two spiritual growth items from the PTGI. The goal was to include items that represented
both traditional religious perspectives and more existential views of spirituality.
To evaluate the relationship between Centrality of Religiosity and Spiritual Growth, participants were
recruited through UNCC’s online research website. Respondents were asked to provide demographic
information and complete the CRS and the PTGI, with the eight new spiritual growth items added. The
participants were pre-screened so that they had all experienced an event that was on a list of potentially
traumatic experiences in the past six months.
LIMITATIONS
DISCUSSION
250 participants completed an online survey which included the CRS and the PTGI with added spirituality items
Mean age of participants 20.74 (SD= 5.75)
69% female, 31% male
Religious affiliation 46% Other, 33% Christian, 16% None, 3% Muslim, 2% Jewish, and .5% Buddhist
Additionally, the results indicated a consistently negative relationship between all of the spirituality
items and the CRS factor of Ideology, suggesting that those reporting high in this factor may have
established a secure foundation of religious beliefs, thus not indicating a severe disturbance by the
traumatic event.
Previous research has shown that positive psychological change often
occurs following exposure to a traumatic event, an experience termed
posttraumatic growth (PTG; Tedeschi & Calhoun, 1996). PTG can be
experienced in five domains: Appreciation of Life; Sense of personal
strength; New possibilities or opportunities; Closeness to others; and
Spiritual/ Religiosity. The PTG model proposes that the experience of a
traumatic event challenges an individual’s core beliefs or views about the
world, resulting in new perspectives about oneself, others, and the world. For
many, these changes are quite positive.
The Posttraumatic Growth Inventory (PTGI) is the most commonly used
measure of these positive psychological changes, consisting of 21 items that
assess the five domains. One criticism of the PTGI has been its narrow
assessment of spiritual growth. Only two items measure spiritual growth, and
those items have shown some weaknesses in cross-cultural studies. To correct
this potential weakness, research is needed to expand the assessment of
spiritual growth.
A previous study explored the assessment of spiritual growth by
developing eight additional spirituality items to more broadly measure
spiritual growth. The Centrality of Religiosity Scale (CRS), a valid and reliable
measure of religiosity, was used to assess the construct validity of the ten
item spirituality composite to adequately measure spirituality/ religiosity. The
CRS assesses the importance of five core areas of spirituality and religiosity:
Public Practice, Private Practice, Religious Experience, Ideology, and
Intellectual (Huber & Huber, 2012). The results revealed a high internal
consistency of the 10 spiritual growth items and strong correlations with the
factors of the CRS.
STUDY AIM
Convenience sample ● Limited generalizability ● Single measure of religiosity
Five-item Composite Betas (p<.05)
PrivPrac Exper Ideol
I have a better understanding of spiritual matters .38 .21
I have a stronger religious faith .38 .36 -.22
I have a greater sense of harmony with the world .32 -.28
I have a deeper sense of connection with the world .27 -.39
I feel more spiritually aware .34 .30 -.24