Are Demographics Important for Forgiveness?

Abstract

The current study primarily investigates the effect of age, gender, education, employment status, number of children, and number of years in marriage on forgiveness of first-married and remarried adults. When corrected for marital status (p < .005) and gender (p < .002), there is a significant main effect of number of children on forgiveness. There are also significant main effects of gender on forgiveness when corrected for education (p < .04), number of children (p < .003), and length of marriage (p < .01). Women's forgiveness is found to be significantly higher than men (p < .005, one-tailed, d = .20). Number of children (r = .092, p < .05) and educational attainment of women (r = .098, p < .05) also indicated a significant positive association with forgiveness.