Examination of the reliationship between forgiveness, ruminative thoughts and life satifaction in adults

The main purpose of the study is to examine the relationship between forgiveness, ruminative thoughts and life satisfaction in adults. Another research problem is to examine the predictive effect of forgiveness and ruminative thoughts on life satisfaction in adults. In addition, it was examined whether gender, age, educational status, relationship status and perception of parental child-rearing attitude showed significant differences. The research was conducted with 477 participants randomly selected among adults in 2024. As a result of removing 24 outliers from the data group, the analysis process started with the data of 453 participants. The data obtained in the study were analyzed using SPSS 25.0 package program. Descriptive statistical methods (number, percentage, mean, standard deviation) were used to evaluate the data. Since all of the scores obtained from the scales showed normal distribution, the analysis continued with parametric tests. Perason Correlation Analysis was used to examine the relationship between variables, Linear Multiple Regression Analysis was used to determine the predictive power of independent variables on the dependent variable, Independent Sample T-Test for the difference between 2 groups, One-Way ANOVA for the difference between 3 or more groups and then Scheffe multiple comparison tests were applied to examine whether socio-demographic variables showed a significant difference between scale scores. According to the findings obtained as a result of the analysis, there is a negative, significant relationship between forgiveness and ruminative thinking; a positive, significant relationship between forgiveness and life satisfaction; and a negative, significant relationship between ruminative thinking and life satisfaction. The predictor variables of ruminative thinking and forgiveness together significantly explain 11% of the total variance in life satisfaction scores. In addition, the results of the analysis show that forgiveness is a positive, significant predictor of individuals' life satisfaction. On the other hand, ruminative thinking did not have a significant predictive effect on life satisfaction. It was seen that ruminative thinking differed in favor of women, and forgiveness and life satisfaction differed in favor of those who had a relationship. As age increased, the level of forgiveness increased significantly, while the level of ruminative thinking increased significantly as age decreased. It was observed that life satisfaction of master's and doctorate graduates was higher than high school graduates. When the perception of parental child rearing attitude was examined, it was seen that the perception of democratic/supportive family attitude differed significantly according to oppressive/authoritarian attitude in forgiveness, oppressive/authoritarian and neglectful attitude in life satisfaction. In the discussion section, the findings were interpreted and suggestions were made for other researchers in the suggestions section