Descriptions of Spirituality among the American Public: The Relationship between Spiritual Salience and Specific Spiritual Understandings.

This article focuses on a nationally representative study examining how American adults understand spirituality and the relationship between the self-ascribed importance (salience) of spirituality and religion and specific conceptualizations of spirituality. The study identified 14 distinct understandings of spirituality, with "peace" being the most commonly endorsed and "structure" the least. Results showed that higher self-reported importance of spirituality was positively associated with all 14 spiritual understandings, whereas religious importance had a more mixed and generally weaker association. The findings support incorporating a measure of spiritual salience into initial client assessments in social work practice, providing practitioners with a framework to explore spirituality in a client-centered manner and potentially leverage spiritual beliefs and practices to support clients’ well-being.