Spirituality and the MMPI-2

Abstract

The present investigation was an exploratory examination of the relation of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2 (MMPI-2; Butcher, Dahlstrom, Graham, Tellegen, & Kaemmer, 1989) Clinical scales to spirituality operationalized in terms of self-reported religious involvement and scores on a multidimensional measure called the Expressions of Spirituality Inventory (ESI; MacDonald, 1997, 2000). MANOVA and correlational results indicate that the MMPI-2 Clinical scales generate patterns of findings consistent with available research on spirituality and health. In particular, persons reporting involvement in organized religion obtained significantly lower MMPI-2 Clinical scale scores and were found to be less likely to obtain a clinically significant score (i.e., t-scores >64) on any of the MMPI-2 scales. Further, with the exception of Masculine-Feminine and Hypomania, all MMPI-2 scales were found to associate appreciably with ESI dimension scores. The study concludes with a brief discussion of the meaning and implications of the findings for future research aimed at investigating the relation of spirituality to health.