Trajectories of Spiritual Change Among Expatriate Humanitarian Aid Workers: A Prospective Longitudinal Study

Expatriate humanitarian aid workers are often exposed to traumatic events and human suffering in the context of their deployments. Internal resources, such as having recourse to a transcendent spiritual framework, may play an important part in creating a meaningful perspective on the work and developing coping strategies to overcome challenging experiences. Aid workers from agencies based in North America and Europe participated in a longitudinal study of stress and mental health between 2005 and 2009 (Lopes Cardozo et al., 2012). Participants completed assessments of spiritual transcendence, trauma exposure, psychiatric distress, and posttraumatic life changes at predeployment (n = 212), postdeployment (n = 170), and a 3- to 6-month follow-up assessment (n = 154). Latent class growth analysis indicated 3 distinct trajectories of spiritual changes across the sample: (1) a group with high spiritual transcendence at predeployment with small, but significant, decreases over time; (2) a group with moderate and stable spiritual transcendence scores; and (3) a group with low and slightly decreasing spiritual transcendence scores over the study period. Participants who reported a religious affiliation were more likely to be in the high spiritual transcendence group, and different trajectories were not associated with likelihood of psychiatric distress at postdeployment or follow-up. However, those reporting higher spiritual transcendence were more likely to report positive life changes following their deployments. Findings suggest that spiritual transcendence was relatively stable in this sample, and that aid workers with greater spiritual transcendence may be more oriented toward personal growth after trauma exposure in their work.