Religious coping with chronic pain

This study examined the role of religious and nonreligious cognitive-behavi oral coping in a sample of 61 chronic pain patients from a midwestern pain clinic. Participants described their chronic pain and indicated their use o f religious and nonreligious cognitive-behavioral coping strategies, Result s supported a multidimensional conceptualization of religious coping that i ncludes both positive and negative strategies. Positive religious coping st rategies were associated significantly with positive affect and religious o utcome after statistically controlling for demographic variables. In contra st, measures of negative religious coping strategies were riot associated s ignificantly with outcome variables. Several significant associations also were found between nonreligious cognitive-behavioral coping strategies and outcome variables. The results underscore the need for further research con cerning the contributions of religious coping in adjustment to chronic pain . Practitioners of applied psychophysiology should assess their chronic pai n patients' religious appraisals and religious coping as another important stress management strategy.