The Mediating Role of Optimism and Pessimism on the Relationship between Spirituality and Depression among Elderly Cancer Patients

Ilsung Nam; Hyunsook Yoon; Yojin Kim; Yeon-Ok Lim; Hyunjoo Lee; Kyoungwon Choi

doi:10.15384/kjhp.2016.16.2.127

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Nam, Yoon, Kim, Lim, Lee, and Choi: The Mediating Role of Optimism and Pessimism on the Relationship between Spirituality and Depression among Elderly Cancer Patients

Original Article

Korean J Health Promot 2016;16(2):127-133.

Published online: 20 January 2016

DOI: https://doi.org/10.15384/kjhp.2016.16.2.127

The Mediating Role of Optimism and Pessimism on the Relationship between Spirituality and Depression among Elderly Cancer Patients

Ilsung Nam^1,, Hyunsook Yoon², Yojin Kim², Yeon-Ok Lim³, Hyunjoo Lee⁴, Kyoungwon Choi⁵

¹Department of Social Welfare, Sungkonghoe University, Seoul, Korea

²Department of Social Welfare, Hallym University, Chuncheon, Korea

³Hallym University Institute of Aging, Hallym University, Chuncheon, Korea

⁴Department of Social Welfare, Hallym Polytechnic University, Chuncheon, Korea

⁵Department of Social Welfare, Graduate School of Hallym University, Chuncheon, Korea

Corresponding author: Ilsung Nam, PhD Department of Social Welfare, Sungkonghoe University, 320 Yeondong-ro, Guro-gu, Seoul 08359, Korea Tel: +82-2-2610-4109, Fax: +82-2-2610-4373 E-mail: ilsungn@gmail.com

Received 17 January 2016 Accepted 13 June 2016

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

Background

Numerous studies have demonstrated that spirituality has protective effects on depression. However, there are only few studies on the theoretical mechanism showing how spirituality effects on depression. Thus, to find mediating variables explaining the relationship between the spirituality and depression may help to develop appropriate program for reducing depression in elderly cancer patients. In this study, we examined the effect of optimism and pessimism as their mediating effects on depression.

Methods

This study is to verify the relationships between spirituality and depression along with the mediating effects of optimism and pessimism among 600 South Korean elderly cancer patients who participated in a community-based study about their mental health.

Results

Optimism and pessimism are linked with spirituality and depression. Higher spirituality levels were associated with increased optimistic thinking, and then optimistic thinking is associated with low possibility of depression, whereas lower spirituality levels were associated with more pessimistic thinking, and in turn pessimistic thinking is associated with high depression scores.

Conclusions

Understanding optimism and pessimism affecting depression level is critical for developing spirituality-based programs to reduce depression in elderly cancer patients.

Keywords: Spirituality, Optimism, Pessimism, Depression, Neoplasms

References

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Table 1.

Regression results predicting depression of spirituality without controlling for optimism constructs

	B	SE	P value
Spirituality	–0.258	0.064	<0.001
Age, y	0.007	0.034	0.302
Female	–0.707	0.620	0.092
Employed	–2.203	0.540	<0.001
Education, y	–0.241	0.055	<0.001
Married	–1.782	0.644	0.003

Abbreviations: SE, standard error.

Table 2.

Structural equation model with endogeneous variables (optimism and pessimism) predicting depression

	Predicting depression			Predicting optimism			Predicting pessimism
	B	SE	P value	B	SE	P value	B	SE	P value
Optimism	–0.698	0.128	<0.001	–	–	–	–	–	–
Pessimism	0.700	0.112	<0.001	–	–	–	–	–	–
Spirituality	–0.074	0.059	0.205	0.172	0.021	< 0.001	–0.091	0.022	<0.001
Age, y	–0.003	0.033	0.702	–0.003	0.013	0.438	0.011	0.013	0.252
Female	–0.289	0.568	0.480	0.381	0.211	0.074	–0.225	0.218	0.319
Employed	–1.603	0.513	0.002	0.322	0.186	0.081	–0.285	0.198	0.124
Education, y	–0.190	0.051	<0.001	0.021	0.019	0.521	–0.053	0.019	0.009
Married	–1.521	0.605	0.023	0.430	0.224	0.091	0.053	0.226	0.718

Abbreviations: B, coefficient; SE, standard error.

Table 3.

Indirect effects of spirituality on depression through optimism and pessimism

	B	SE	95% Confidence interval
	B	SE	Lower	Upper
Depression → Optimism → Spirituality	–0.120	0.030	–0.178	–0.062
Depression → Pessimism → Spirituality	–0.063	0.019	–0.100	–0.026

Abbreviations: B, coefficient; SE, standard error.

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