Abstracts for Listed 2009 Empirical Publications

S FOR LISTED 2009 EMPIRICAL PUBLICATIONS (ONLY FIRST AUTHOR LISTED UNLESS MULTIPLE ARTICLES BY SAME FIRST AUTHOR) Note: In press abstracts not included Balkin The professional literature diverges in defining the role of forgiveness and reconciliation in counseling regarding how forgiveness and reconciliation are conceptualized from a professional and secular perspective. The Jewish conceptualization of forgiveness is multifaceted; mechila the forgiveness of debt, is particularly important in providing a framework for forgiveness when the issue of reconciliation is involved. The authors offer an explanation of the Jewish conceptualization of forgiveness and discuss a way to infuse the concept of mechila into counseling practice on a broader level with all clients. Burnette The authors investigated the associations between attachment, empathy, rumination, forgiveness, and depressive symptoms via the framework of attachment theory. Participants (N = 221; 141 F and 80 M) completed a battery of questionnaires. We hypothesized that (a) anxious and avoidant attachment would be negatively linked to dispositional forgiveness; (b) the anxious attachmentforgiveness link would be mediated through excessive rumination; (c) the avoidance attachmentforgiveness link would be mediated through lack of empathy; and (d) the insecure attachmentdepression relation would, in turn, be partially mediated by the forgiveness process. SEM modeling confirmed these propositions, revealing the potential deleterious outcomes associated with insecure attachment and unforgiving responses to offenses. Egan In recent decades, school bullying has come to be recognized as a serious problem for students across the world. A substantial body of research has demonstrated that school bullying leads to significant negative outcomes for its targets. Bullying is also difficult to combat, with even the best interventions achieving only limited success. Thus, it is inevitable that some students will be bullied. This is why many researchers have investigated various coping strategies by which students might deal with the harmful effects of bullying. It is proposed that the process of forgiveness could act as an effective coping resource, allowing students to replace bullyinginduced negative emotions with other-focused positive emotions. Indeed, bullying is characterized by interpersonal transgressions, and forgiveness has been conceptualized as a coping response to precisely such offenses. This paper explores the links between bullying and forgiveness, presents a new model of the pathways linking forgiveness and coping, and discusses how forgiveness could be applied within school-based initiatives. Theoretical issues and directions for future research are also discussed. Abstracts 2009 Updated July 1, 2009 1s 2009 Updated July 1, 2009 1 Greene This article reports preliminary results of a Templeton Foundation-funded research project on the role of resiliency and forgiveness in 133 elderly Holocaust survivors. We use resilience theory to explore how individuals heal following exposure to an adverse event. We present preliminary findings on survivors' perceptions of their resiliency before, during, and after the Holocaust and suggest a paradigm shift to one in which maintaining competence is primary. In subsequent publications, we will synthesize the frameworks that comprise survivorship to create a model. These findings inform mental health care practitioners' understanding of factors that buffer against the effects of adverse events. Gordon This study examined relations between aspects of family functioning and positive and negative dimensions of forgiveness. Increased understanding of one's partner and decreased anger about betrayal characterize positive forgiveness, whereas experiences such as holding a grudge and desiring revenge indicate negative forgiveness. The sample included 87 wives and 74 husbands who reported experiencing a significant betrayal, their partners, and their adolescent children. Analyses of reported forgiveness revealed that more negative forgiveness was associated with lower marital satisfaction for husbands and wives; trust partially mediated this relationship for husbands and wives. Greater positive forgiveness reported by husbands and wives predicted their own reports of a stronger parenting alliance, whereas greater negative forgiveness reported by husbands and wives predicted their spouses' reports of a weaker parenting alliance. For wives, more negative forgiveness also predicted higher levels of children's perceived parental conflict, and parents' reported conflict mediated this association for wives. Findings suggest that forgiveness of a marital betrayal is significantly associated with marital satisfaction, the parenting alliance, and children's perceptions of parental marital functioning. Hernandez To examine the relation between hostility and cardiovascular reactivity to stress, 42 undergraduate men were categorized into high and low hostile groups based on responses to the Cook Medley Hostility Scale. Participants engaged in two laboratory tasks: a Cognitive Task (mental arithmetic) and a Social Task (confrontation role-play). Cardiovascular measures of heart rate and blood pressure were obtained throughout rest and task periods and participants provided ratings of state anger and forgiveness following task completion. Results revealed that low hostile participants exhibited greater systolic blood pressure (SBP) responses to both tasks than high hostile participants (p < .05), but no significant group differences were observed for heart rate or diastolic blood pressure. High hostile men reported greater state anger during resting conditions and less forgiveness following completion of tasks than low-hostile counterparts, but neither of these findings moderated the relation between hostility and SBP reactivity. Higher ratings of forgiveness were associated with lower SBP reactivity. These findings show that hostility is not always associated with exaggerated cardiovascular reactivity to stress, and the influence of various moderating factors should be considered in elucidating this relation. Abstracts 2009 Updated July 1, 2009 2s 2009 Updated July 1, 2009 2