This national study explored potential social inequalities in the spiritual health of young people in Canada. This study was based on the premise that positive spiritual health can be a significant health asset and contribute to thriving among adolescents.
Data for this study was drawn from the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) health promotion study affiliated with the World Health Organization. The HBSC international study involves written health surveys conducted with students in classroom settings. The focus is on adolescents 11 to 15 years old. Cycle 7 of the HBSC was conducted in 2014 and involved over 20,000 students representing all Canadian provinces and territories. The HBSC included a series of eight questions concerning spiritual health and the four “relational domains of spirituality”: (1) connections with oneself; (2) connections with others; (3) connections with the natural world; and (4) connections with a ''transcendent other.'' The focus of the questions was on the perceived importance of spiritual health to young people rather than their lived experiences. In addition to other health-related information, students also reported their age, gender, school grade level, self-perceived measure of material wealth or advantage, and immigration status. The students' province or territory of residence was also recorded. The main goal of the data analysis was to profile potential inequalities in the perceived importance of spiritual health to Canadian adolescents according to several key socio-demographic factors. Another goal of the analysis was to explore methodologically the approach used by the researchers in assessing adolescent spiritual health.
Results indicated strong socio-demographic inequalities in the spiritual health measures by age, gender, relative material wealth, immigration status, and province/territory. For the overall scale and by sub-domain, girls reported spiritual health as being more important than did boys. For both boys and girls, ratings of the importance of spiritual health declined with age. The most striking declines were for connections with nature and the natural environment, and connections with the transcendent. As perceived relative wealth increased, the importance of spiritual health increased. Recent immigrants gave higher ratings to the importance of spiritual health than did youth born in Canada. The reported importance of spiritual health varied widely across the provinces and territories, with particularly large variations in connections with “nature and the natural environment” and the “transcendent.”
The identified differences in how boys and girls relate to the four sub-domains of spiritual health suggest that efforts to promote healthy connections may be more effective if planned around gender-specific approaches. This study, along with other research, suggests that inequalities in spiritual health might be addressed by intentionally increasing adolescents' exposure to the natural world. In addition to reinforcing the idea that the origins of spiritual health are in part cultural, this study also highlights opportunities for methodological advances in the assessment of some key components of adolescent spiritual health.
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