Spiritual Functioning Among Veterans Seeking Residential Treatment for PTSD: A Matched Control Group Study

A total of 788 persons completed the Brief Multidimensional Measure of Religiousness and Spirituality (BMMRS; Fetzer Institute/NIA, 1999), comprising 2 primary comparisons: (1) Vietnam veterans presenting for residential treatment for PTSD in the Veterans Affairs (VA) Heath Care System (PTSD; n 194) versus demographically matched men from the 1998 General Social Survey (GSS; n 194); and (2) veterans from the Iraq/Afghanistan Wars seeking PTSD residential treatment outside of the VA (n 200) versus a younger group of demographically matched controls from the GSS (n 200). When compared to their control group counterparts, veterans from the 2 clinical samples endorsed weaker spirituality across nearly all dimensions assessed in the study (daily spiritual experiences, forgiveness, private practices, religious coping, organizational religiousness, values). Results of other comparisons further revealed that veterans from these 2 eras largely did not differ from one another in their spiritual functioning, and that the 2 PTSD treatment groups reported weaker spiritual functioning with respect to controls from the other age group as well. Spirituality factors were also generally correlated with PTSD symptom severity at the start of treatment and multivariate results found that greater forgiveness problems were uniquely linked with more symptomatology across both eras. Although this design limits our ability to assess changes in spirituality, these findings support the need for spiritually integrative therapeutic models and additional research on the spiritual/existential implications of combat trauma. The article concludes with a case illustration and discussion of clinical applications related to empirical findings.