Depression is a leading cause of illness and disability among adolescents worldwide (World Health Organization [WHO], 2014b). Adolescent depression is associated with higher rates of its reoccurrence in adulthood (Gladstone et al., 2011), and represents a significant cost burden on personal and societal scales (Greden, 2001; Tuisku et al., 2014). Researchers have sought to identify positive and negative correlates for the reduction of depressive symptoms among adolescents (Allison et al., 2005; Bilski et al., 2013; Koivumaa-Honkanen et al., 2004; Muris et al., 2001). Religiousness/spirituality has been consistently identified as a negative correlate in adult depression (Bonelli et al., 2012; Koenig et al., 2001) as well as adolescent substance use and other health related problems (Amoateng & Bahr, 1986; Dew et al., 2008; Kent, 1990; Knight et al., 2007; Rew & Wong, 2006; Ritt-Olson et al., 2004). However, the relationship between religiousness/spirituality and adolescent depression remains ambiguous and requires further study (Dew et al., 2008).
Recently, the nature of the religiousness/spirituality construct was recognized as multidimensional and inter-related (Fetzer Institute, 2003; Wong et al., 2006). Forgiveness, as one of the dimensions of religiousness/spirituality, has been vigorously researched in adult health-related outcomes (Toussaint et al., 2008), including adult depression (Thompson et al., 2005). However, only a few studies have examined the relationship between forgiveness and depressive symptoms among adolescents (Dew et al., 2008; Dew et al., 2010).
The purpose of the study was to examine the relationship between forgiveness and depressive symptoms reported by 12 to 18 year old adolescents who routinely visited three ethnically diverse family medicine clinics in the New England area. The study focused on three dimensions of forgiveness: intrapersonal (forgiving self), interpersonal (forgiving others), and divine (knowing that God forgives). Additionally, other relationships were examined as they related to gender and developmental stages of young, middle, and late adolescence. The study used previously collected data that was used for publication by the Center for Adolescent Substance Abuse Research [CeASAR] (Knight et al., 2007; Harris et al., 2008). Chi square analyses were used to examine whether observed frequencies between each dimension of forgiveness and depression, each dimension of forgiveness and developmental stage, and each dimension of forgiveness and gender would significantly differ from what would be expected by chance.
Results of the current study were not found to be statistically significant, which is incongruent with previous studies examining depression and forgiveness among adolescents in psychiatric outpatient (Dew et al., 2008) and inpatient (Dew et al., 2010) settings. The lack of significant findings and inconsistency with previous research might indicate the absence of an association between the three dimensions of forgiveness and depression across gender and developmental stages among healthy adolescents. However, more research needs to be done on this matter, as this the first study to focus on examining these variables among healthy adolescents.