PERCEIVED INFLUENCE OF SPIRITISM ON MENTAL HEALTH AND DAILY LIFE: A CROSS-SECTIONAL STUDY

Abstract

Background: Religion and spirituality may provide meaning, belonging, and coping resources, but their relationships with mental health are multidimensional, context dependent, and cannot be inferred from religious affiliation alone. Objective: To describe the perceived influence of Spiritism on mental health and daily life and to contextualize it in relation to religious identification and measured Spiritist involvement. Methods: This descriptive cross-sectional analysis used online data collected between 2021 and 2022 from 848 adults living in Ceará, Brazil. Items from the Spiritist Involvement Form and the Spiritist Involvement Level score were analyzed. Absolute and relative frequencies were calculated using valid item-specific denominators. Results: Among respondents with valid data, 78.8% identified Spiritism as their religion, 76.7% selected “very much” or “completely” for affinity, and 61.5% had been connected to Spiritism for more than 10 years. “Very much” or “completely” was selected for perceived influence most frequently for mental health (81.6%), followed by family relationships (78.2%), self-care (76.9%), socialization (75.4%), work (71.9%), marital relationships (70.9%), and political views (66.3%). In contrast, 66.4% were classified as having very low or low Spiritist Involvement Level during the pandemic, whereas 11.5% had high or very high involvement. Conclusion: Participants perceived substantial influence of Spiritism across several domains, especially mental health, despite predominantly low measured involvement. This contrast between aggregate distributions does not demonstrate an individual-level association or clinical benefit and should be interpreted in light of the cross-sectional design, nonprobability sampling, and pandemic-related restrictions.