Chelsea L. Greer

Efficacy of a self-forgiveness workbook: a randomized controlled trial with interpersonal offenders.

The present study tested the efficacy of a 6-hr self-directed workbook intervention designed to increase self-forgiveness and reduce self-condemnation among perpetrators of interpersonal offenses. University students (N = 204) were randomly assigned to either an immediate treatment or wait-list control condition, and assessments were administered on 3 occasions. Treatment led to increases in self-forgiveness and decreases in self-condemnation. Stronger treatment effects were associated with (a) lower levels of dispositional self-forgivingness, (b) higher levels of transgression severity, and (c) higher dose of treatment. In summary, the workbook appeared to facilitate self-forgiveness among perpetrators of interpersonal wrongdoing, though replication trials are needed to build from these preliminary findings.

Forgiveness and spirituality in organizational life: theory, status of research, and new ideas for discovery

Spirituality is one’s intimacy and closeness with something beyond the self that is held to be sacred (i.e. God, humankind, nature, the cosmos). Workplace conflict and lingering resultant unforgiveness disrupt individuals’ senses of spirituality in the workplace – both in their individual lives and their sense of shared spiritual closeness. Forgiveness is one important way to restore spiritual harmony. We define forgiveness, and briefly review the literature addressing forgiveness in organizations. We also present a model of relational spirituality and forgiveness that addresses how spiritual appraisals around transgressions can help or hinder forgiving and communication around transgressions. We apply this model of spirituality and forgiveness to organizations. We conclude by noting areas of future research needed in this area.

Efficacy of REACH Forgiveness Across Cultures

OBJECTIVE This study investigates the efficacy of the 6-hour REACH Forgiveness intervention among culturally diverse undergraduates. METHOD Female undergraduates (N = 102) and foreign extraction (46.2%) and domestic (43.8%) students in the United States were randomly assigned to immediate treatment or waitlist conditions. Treatment efficacy and the effect of culture on treatment response were assessed using measures of emotional and decisional forgiveness across 3 time periods. RESULTS Students in the treatment condition reported greater improvement in emotional forgiveness, but not decisional forgiveness, relative to those in the waitlist condition. Gains were maintained at a 1-week follow-up. Although culture did not moderate the effect of treatment, a main effect of culture on emotional forgiveness and marginally significant interaction effect of culture on decisional forgiveness were found. CONCLUSION The REACH Forgiveness intervention was efficacious for college students from different cultural backgrounds when conducted in the United States. However, some evidence may warrant development of culturally adapted forgiveness interventions.

The Transgressor's Response to Denied Forgiveness

The study of forgiveness has flourished in recent years, but little is known about how transgressors respond when their request for forgiveness is denied. Two studies examined how transgressors react to a denied request for forgiveness in romantic relationships. Across both studies, when participants were denied forgiveness or delayed in receiving a forgiving response, they exhibited differences in the degree to which they held unforgiving motivations (e.g., anger and avoidance) and experienced positive emotions (e.g., empathy). The observed effects remained even after controlling for relationship commitment in Study 2. These results expand our knowledge of forgiveness processes by describing in more detail the internal experience and motivations of the transgressor toward the victim when forgiveness is denied, which has implications for relational repair (e.g., transgressors motivations toward re-engaging and repairing the relationship) after an offense has occurred in romantic relationships.

A Qualitative Review and Integrative Model of Gratitude and Physical Health

Gratitude is seen as a central component of Christian theology, and the extant literature suggests that there is an important relation between gratitude and physical health and well-being. In the current review, we summarize 42 studies published since 2009 that inform this relationship. Based on the theoretical framework by Hill, Allemand, and Roberts (2013), we organize our review in three sections that focus on how gratitude influences physical health through (a) mental health, (b) health behaviors, and (c) interpersonal variables. We discuss and integrate the findings from these studies into a theoretical model of gratitude and physical health. In addition to the three mechanisms in the Hill et al. model, we integrate variables from a previously conducted literature review of gratitude and well-being (Wood, Froh, & Geraghty, 2010), and we add personal factors, positive or adverse events, and explicit interventions as antecedents to gratitude in our model. We conclude by discussing future directions for gratitude and health research and its role within Christian psychology.

The Contributions of Christian Perspectives and Practices to Positive Psychology

We summarize contributions of Christianity to positive psychology. There are three initial caveats. First, the diversity of Christian views and practices across cultures and throughout history has not been universally positive. Second, positive sources of well-being specifically due to Christianity are challenging to isolate. Third, culture is difficult to separate from religion. Christianity has made contributions to culture and intellectual thought and to individual and societal operations through virtues. Christianity supplements secular views of virtue by a Christian telos as maintaining a faithful and authentic relationship with God and by not being focused on raising up oneself, but about serving. Christianity promotes virtue by strengthening self-control and self-regulation, clarifying and focusing goals, and promoting other (related) virtues. It emphasizes two cardinal virtues—love and forgiveness. Future research directions depend on testing these suppositions. We must formulating testable hypotheses and organize existing research and accumulate additional research addressing each proposition.