Edmondson Donald, Park Crystal L, Chaudoir Stephenie R, Wortmann Jennifer H
University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT 06269, USA.
Psychol Sci. 2008 Aug;19(8):754-8. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-9280.2008.02152.x.
Religious worldviews often provide comfort near the end of life, but they can cause distress if life circumstances are perceived as evidence of God's disfavor. This study, the first to test terror management theory (TMT) with terminally ill participants, examined the hypothesis that concerns about death mediate the relationship between religious struggle (and religious comfort) and depression in the terminally ill. Ninety-eight patients with end-stage congestive heart failure (CHF) completed measures of religious comfort, religious struggle, belief in an afterlife, concerns about death, and depression. In separate hierarchical linear regression models that controlled for degree of belief in an afterlife, death concerns fully mediated the relationships between religious struggle and depression and between religious comfort and depression. These findings suggest that religious struggle is a breakdown in the terror management system that leaves the individual vulnerable to the terror of death, and that properly functioning religious worldviews offer comfort by buffering the individual against death concerns.
宗教世界观通常在生命末期提供慰藉，但如果生活境遇被视为上帝不悦的证据，它们可能会引发痛苦。本研究首次对晚期患者进行了恐惧管理理论（TMT）测试，检验了死亡担忧在宗教挣扎（和宗教慰藉）与晚期患者抑郁之间的关系中起中介作用这一假设。98名终末期充血性心力衰竭（CHF）患者完成了宗教慰藉、宗教挣扎、来世信仰、死亡担忧和抑郁的测量。在控制来世信仰程度的单独分层线性回归模型中，死亡担忧完全中介了宗教挣扎与抑郁之间以及宗教慰藉与抑郁之间的关系。这些发现表明，宗教挣扎是恐惧管理系统的崩溃，使个体容易受到死亡恐惧的影响，而正常运作的宗教世界观通过缓冲个体对死亡的担忧来提供慰藉。
