FORGIVENESS AS AN INTERVENTION GOAL WITH INCEST SURVIVORS

An intervention, with forgiveness toward their abuser as the goal, was implemented with 12 female incest survivors. The women, from a midwes tern city, were 24 to 54 years old, and all were Caucasian. A yoked, r andomized experimental and control group design was used. The particip ants were randomly assigned to an experimental group (receiving the fo rgiveness intervention immediately) or a waiting-list control group (r eceiving the intervention when their matched experimental counterpart finished the intervention). Each participant met individually with the intervener once per week. The average length of the intervention for the 12 participants was 14.3 months. A process model of forgiveness wa s used as the focus of intervention. Dependent variables included forg iveness, self-esteem, hope, psychological depression, and state-trait anxiety scales. After the intervention, the experimental group gained more than the control group in forgiveness and hope and decreased sign ificantly more than the control group in anxiety and depression. When the control group then began the program they showed similar change pa tterns to the above, as well as in self-esteem improvement.