The Relationship between Spiritual Intelligence and Quality Of Life in Elderlies

Spiritual intelligence is a dimension of spiritual health, which facilitates human adaptation to his/her environment. Since beliefs, culture and spiritual commitments can be associated with positive outcomes such as physical and psychological health, satisfaction with life, favorable interpersonal performance and better quality of life, the present study was conducted to determine the relationship between spiritual intelligence and quality of life of older people covered by health centers in the city of Kashmar in 2015-16.
This was a cross-sectional study in which 430 eligible elderlies living in urban and rural areas of the city of Kashmar were selected through stratified random sampling. Research instruments were spiritual intelligence questionnaires of Abdullah Zadeh et al. and quality of life questionnaire LEIPAD. For data analysis, test and Spearman's correlation coefficient were used.
According to the results, the average score of elderlies’ spiritual intelligence in Kashmar city (114.79 ± 6.15) was at an optimum level and the qualities of their lives (52.94 ± 6.56) were assessed as medium. In addition, there was a significant negative correlation between the mean score of spiritual intelligence level and the quality of life among elderlies in Kashmar city (P = 0.01, r = -124).
The present study results showed that despite the inverse and significant relationship found between the mean score of spiritual intelligence and the mean score of quality of life in elderlies of Kashmar, the results obtained showed the need for further studies in other parts of the country with different cultural, economic and social backgrounds, and with different sample sizes (smaller or larger), given the mutual effects of spiritual intelligence and quality of life of elderlies as a factor affecting positive outcomes such as physical and mental health, satisfaction with life and favorable performance among them.