| Purpose of this study was to investigate effects of Psycho-Spiritual Integrative Therapy (PSIT) on cancer patients' spirituality. PSIT integrates psychotherapy with spiritual practices to help participants actualize their highest aspirations or life purpose. Main hypothesis was that participation in PSIT would significantly increase participant's spirituality, which was tested through 4 subhypotheses. First subhypothesis compared the pre and posttest measures of a treatment group to a waitlist control group. Second compared the treatment group's pretests to their post and follow-up tests. Third compared pretests of the control group after they received treatment to their post and follow-up tests, and the fourth subhypotheses combined treatment group's measures with control group's measures after receiving treatment to compare pretest to post and follow-up tests. Data used were collected from a larger randomized wait-list control trial of 41 cancer survivors, where the control also experienced the PSIT intervention after the treatment group. Current study used data from 4 measures of spirituality administered to both groups: Self-Transcendence Scale (SfTS), Functional Assessment of Chronic Illness Therapy--Spiritual--Expanded (FACIT-Sp-Ex), Spiritual Transformation Scale (STS), and Philadelphia Mindfulness Scale (PHLMS). This study used a Hierarchical Linear Modeling (HLM), 1-tailed analysis in the 4 subhypothesis to explore PSIT's effect on participants' spirituality. Findings included significant changes in the expected direction with the SfTS in all 4 subhypothesis. In comparison to a waitlist control participants in the PSIT treatment group experienced significantly greater self-transcendence ( p = .05, d = .36, CI = -.46---5.76) and FACIT-Sp-Ex faith (p = .03, d = .34, CI = -.08---3.84). The other subhypotheses showed significant improvements in the SfTS, FACIT-Sp-Ex (total score and meaning/peace and faith subscales), STS (spiritual decline subscale), and PHLMS (awareness subscale). Limitations of this study include small sample size and using multiple assessments. Further research with larger groups is warranted. |
