title: Spiritual Intimacy, Marital Intimacy, and Physical/Psychological Well-Being: Spiritual Meaning as a Mediator.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Intimacy is an essential part of marital relationships, spiritual relationships, and is also a factor in well-being, but there is little research simultaneously examining the links among spiritual intimacy, marital intimacy, and well-being.
  
  
  METHODS
  Structural equation modeling was used to examine associations among the latent variables-spiritual intimacy, marital intimacy, spiritual meaning, and well-being-in a cross-sectional study of 5,720 married adults aged 29-100 years (M= 58.88,SD= 12.76, 59% female). All participants were from the Adventist Health Study-2, Biopsychosocial Religion and Health Study.
  
  
  RESULTS
  In the original structural model, all direct associations between the three latent variables of spiritual intimacy, marital intimacy, and well-being were significantly positive indicating that there was a significant relationship among spiritual intimacy, marital intimacy, and well-being. When spiritual meaning was added as a mediating variable, the direct connections of spiritual intimacy to marital intimacy and to well-being became weakly negative. However, the indirect associations of spiritual intimacy with marital intimacy and with well-being were then strongly positive through spiritual meaning. This indicates that the relationship among spiritual intimacy, marital intimacy, and well-being was primarily a result of the meaning that spiritual intimacy brought to one's marriage and well-being, and that without spiritual meaning greater spirituality could negatively influence one's marriage and well-being.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These findings suggest the central place of spiritual meaning in understanding the relationship of spiritual intimacy to marital intimacy and to well-being.
authors.affiliation: School of Public Health, Loma Linda University.
authors.forename: Karen J
authors.initials: KJ
authors.lastname: Holland
authors.affiliation: School of Public Health, Loma Linda University.
authors.forename: Jerry W
authors.initials: JW
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.affiliation: School of Public Health, Loma Linda University.
authors.forename: Helen H
authors.initials: HH
authors.lastname: Marshak
authors.affiliation: La Sierra University.
authors.forename: Leslie R
authors.initials: LR
authors.lastname: Martin
keywords: intimacy; marital intimacy; marriage; meaning in life; spiritual intimacy; well-being