Ability to forgive strongly correlated with human flourishing: study
June 17, 2024
A recent study by the American Bible Society (ABS) shows that the willingness to forgive plays a strong role in an individual’s level of human flourishing.
The Christian Post reports that the third installment of the State of the Bible USA 2024 Report by the ABS also shows that a positive relationship with the Bible is the strongest predictor of human flourishing among young people.
John Farquhar Plake is the State of the Bible Editor-in-Chief and Chief Innovation Officer for the ABS.
In a statement released to the Christian Post, Plake said: “For the last two years, we’ve reported some rather troubling statistics about Generation Z. As a group, these 18-27-year-olds are less connected with the church and the Bible than older generations. They also experience more stress and less hope.”
Plake contrasted those findings with what the study reveals about young adults who read the Bible regularly: “Not only do they score higher on the Human Flourishing scale than other young adults who read the Bible — but they have the highest score of any generation. There’s more research to be done here, but this suggests that the unique challenges keeping young adults from flourishing are countered by a regular interaction with God in Scripture.”
The study also showed a strong correlation between an individual’s ability to forgive and their level of human flourishing. Respondents were asked about their level of agreement with the statement: “I am able to sincerely forgive whatever someone else has done to me, regardless of whether they ask for forgiveness or not.”
Those who “strongly agreed” with the statement had a much higher average score on the human flourishing index (7.6) than those who said they “strongly disagreed” with the statement (5.4).
The research is based on responses collected from 2,506 adults in the U.S. between Jan. 4-23 and shows that Generation Z has an average score of 6.4 on the Human Flourishing Index.
Photo: top, Credit: iStock/Teenager