Date
8-20-2026
Department
School of Behavioral Sciences
Degree
Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD)
Chair
Natalie A. Hamrick
Keywords
Adverse life events, experiencing God’s grace, frequency of church attendance, reciprocity norms, religious struggle, self-rated health, viral infection rates, health, religiosity.
Disciplines
Psychology | Religion
Recommended Citation
Slot, Calvin Jay, "Grace, Reciprocity Norms, Adverse Life Events, Religious Struggle, Salience of Religion, Relationship to God As Modifiers" (2026). Doctoral Dissertations and Projects. 8792.
https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/doctoral/8792
Abstract
The purpose of this quantitative study was to determine whether adverse life events, reciprocity norms, relationship to God, salience of religion, religious struggle and/or grace moderate the frequency of church attendance-physical health relationship or if the psychospiritual variables interact with adverse life events (ALE). 1,000 participants were recruited through Prolific to produce a sample representative of the United States population. An additional 20 participants were recruited through pastors of three churches in Illinois. Multiple linear regression revealed relationship to God, religious struggle, reciprocity norms, and ALE were moderators. Additionally, religious struggle and negative reciprocity norms interacted with adverse life events, with some differences between frequency of upper respiratory tract infection rates and self-rated physical health. Experiencing God’s grace and salience of religion acted as neither a moderator nor interacted with ALE in the frequency of church attendance-physical health relationship. Experiencing God’s grace did mediate the frequency of church attendance-SRH relationship and was the most influential religious variable in increasing SRH as determined by a hierarchical regression. Religious struggle was the most influential variable to decrease measures of physical health. Positive reciprocity norms (PRN), negative reciprocity norms (NRN), and ALE were predictors of religious struggle. All three variables, PRN, NRN, and RS, were negatively correlated with frequency of church attendance. Overall, this departure from other studies on a health effect from religiosity/spirituality suggests a need for a new paradigm to guide future studies into a health effect from religiosity and/or spirituality.
