Validation of the Brief RCOPE in Portuguese Family Caregivers of Adults with Health Conditions

Promoting Spiritual Coping of Family Caregivers of an Adult Relative with Severe Mental Illness: Development and Test of a Nursing Intervention

Severe mental illness disrupts daily functioning, burdening family caregivers, who often adopt spiritual coping strategies. With comprehensive skills, mental health nurses can promote well-being and mental health. The aim is to develop and test the nursing intervention "promoting spiritual coping" in the family caregivers of home-dwelling people with mental illness. This study was conducted in two distinct stages. Initially, the intervention was developed according to the first phase of the Framework for Developing and Evaluating Complex Interventions. Secondly, the intervention protocol was tested in a mixed-method pilot study. An intervention protocol was developed and tested on ten family caregivers. The intervention comprised three sessions, and before-and-after assessments were conducted. Significant improvements were observed in the outcomes, with caregivers expressing that discussing spirituality and religiosity benefited them. This intervention prioritized the therapeutic relationship of the nurses and family caregivers. The intervention "promoting spiritual coping" was created and evaluated as a suitable approach for mental health nurses to use in a psychotherapeutic context with family caregivers of individuals with mental illness.

Battles of the Soul: Validation of the Scale of Religious and Spiritual Struggles (RSS) for the Portuguese Population

This study aims to adapt and validate the Religious and Spiritual Struggles Scale for the Portuguese population. The sample consisted of 732 participants with various religious affiliations. The exploratory factor analysis showed that it consists of six dimensions, similar to the initial instrument. A KMO of 0.91 was obtained. The confirmatory factor analysis confirmed the existence of six factors and showed adequate fit indices. Internal consistency and construct reliability were above 0.70. The analysis of the psychometric qualities of this instrument indicates that it can be applied to the Portuguese population and is a valuable instrument for psychotherapeutic practice and studies in the psychology of religion and spirituality.

Psychometric Properties of the Haitian Creole Brief Religious Coping Scale (RCOPE) with a Sample of Adult Haitians Impacted by the 2010 Earthquake

The current study investigated the psychometric properties of the Haitian Creole version of the Brief Religious Coping Scale (Brief RCOPE). A total of 256 adult survivors of the 2010 earthquake in Haiti completed the Brief RCOPE and measures of posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms, resilience, general coping, and posttraumatic growth. The results showed the Brief RCOPE to have excellent internal consistency reliability α = .94 and α = .85 for the positive religious coping and negative religious coping, respectively. Confirmatory factor analysis showed construct validity for the Brief RCOPE subscales. The results also showed evidence of convergent validity of the Brief RCOPE in relation to measures of positive spiritual change and religion. Independent t-tests revealed statistically significant gender differences in scores on the positive religious coping subscales as women scored higher than men. These findings suggest that the psychometric properties of the Haitian Creole version of the Brief RCOPE are adequate for the assessment of religious coping with Haitian adults exposed to a natural disaster.

Reproducibility of the brief religious coping inventory with African athletes' sample using ordinal factor analytical approach

Background

Previous studies have revealed that religious coping strategy is common among athletes due to the stressful experiences before and during competitions as part of the mental preparations they go through, the uncertainty of sporting outcomes, and other organizational issues they encounter. This research assessed the reproducibility of the Brief Religious Coping (RCOPE) instrument in an African setting using athletes' samples from different countries. Particularly, the research sought to assess the (1) factor structure of Brief RCOPE with an African sample, (2) construct validity of the RCOPE measure, and (3) measurement invariance of the RCOPE instrument based on gender and nationality.

Methods

The study surveyed a convenient sample of 300 athletes, including 164 male and 136 female athletes, from 3 African countries (Benin, Ghana, and Nigeria) who participated in the 2018 West African University Games. The Brief RCOPE instrument was administered to the athletes for validation purposes before the competition. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were conducted using the ordinal factor analytic approach.

Results

This validation study confirmed the two-factor dimension (positive and negative religious coping) of the Brief RCOPE measure. Further, all items for each of the dimensions of the inventory contributed significantly to the measure of the Brief RCOPE domains. The positive and negative religious coping dimensions contributed more than half of the variance of their respective indicators. Measurement invariance across gender and nationality was confirmed.

Conclusion

Sufficient evidence was gathered to support the interpretation and use of the Brief RCOPE measure. Coaches and sports psychologists could adopt the Brief RCOPE measure to understand the mental or thought patterns of religious athletes based on existential concerns or stress accrued from impending competitions to inform appropriate religious coping interventions. This notwithstanding, the Minimum Clinical Important Difference (MCID) of the Brief RCOPE should be further investigated to enhance the utility of the instrument for use in intervention-based studies.