Wisdom and wellbeing in polish older adults: the mediating role of forgiveness

Frontiers in Psychology

Psychology

Kinga Kaleta¹  Paweł Brudek²  Stanisława Steuden³ 

[1] Department of Psychology, Jan Kochanowski University of Kielce, Kielce, Poland;Department of Psychology, John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin, Lublin, Poland;Department of Psychology, University of Economics and Human Sciences, Warsaw, Poland;Department of Psychology, University of Economics and Human Sciences, Warsaw, Poland;

关键词: wisdom;    forgiveness;    wellbeing;    older adult;    positive aging;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1163113

 received in 2023-02-10, accepted in 2023-08-03,  发布年份 2023

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

ObjectivesPossible correlations between wisdom and wellbeing among older people have been extensively debated in psychology. At the same time, researchers emphasize that the effect of older adults' wisdom on their wellbeing depends on numerous mediators. A review of the literature suggests that forgiveness might be one such variable. Thus, this study aimed to investigate whether forgiveness mediated the relationship between wisdom and wellbeing in late adulthood.MethodIn total, 481 participants aged from 60 to 92 years (M = 68.84; SD = 6.31) were involved in the study. All older people participating in the study lived independently in their households. Four psychological instruments were used: (1) the Self-Assessed Wisdom Scale; (2) the Heartland Forgiveness Scale; (3) the Psychological Wellbeing Scale; and (4) the Satisfaction with Life Scale. Therefore, the measurement of the analyzed variables was self-reported.ResultsThe results showed that forgiveness mediated the relationships between wisdom and wellbeing in the older population. The indirect effects demonstrated that forgiveness mediated the relationships between wisdom and wellbeing. Wisdom related to higher forgiveness (β = 0.21; p < 0.01), which, in turn, was related to a higher level of psychological (β = 0.48; p < 0.01) and subjective (β = 0.36; p < 0.01) wellbeing.ConclusionThese findings suggest that forgiveness is an important element of wisdom and wellbeing. The greater the wisdom the participants showed, the stronger the tendency to forgive and the better wellbeing they reported.

【 授权许可】

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Copyright © 2023 Brudek, Steuden and Kaleta.