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Health Help-Seeking Behaviour in Spiritual Healing Practice: Records from the Panacea Society’s Healing Department, 1924–1997

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Abstract

Why people seek help is a question shared by both health psychologists and scholars of spiritual healing. This overlap, however, has gone unexplored. This article shows convergence between health help-seeking behaviours in spiritual healing and secular professional health services. It does so by drawing on the archival records from the Panacea Society in Bedford, England, which began an international healing ministry by post-amassing over 120,000 correspondents from 93 different countries. Archives from the Panacea Society’s Healing Department containing records of the self-reported effects of the prescribed water-taking healing ritual were used to investigate variables related to help-seeking for health problems through spiritual healing. A sample of over 10% of the available records (n = 7192) contained data from 40,627 letters written over a 73-year period from 48 different countries. In line with research from health psychology, and specifically the Health Belief Model, findings showed that those who were older, female, and receiving perceived benefits from treatment were more likely to engage in help-seeking.

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Funding

The research was supported by a grant from the Panacea Charitable Trust (a charitable organization distinct from the Panacea Society that supports research and education) to Fraser Watts, from which Ryan Williams and Alastair Lockhart received employment

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Historical and Philosophical Inquiry, University of Queensland, St Lucia, Brisbane, QLD, 4072, Australia

    Ryan J. Williams

  2. School of Psychology, University of Lincoln, 19 Grantchester Rd, Cambridge, CB3 9ED, UK

    Fraser Watts

  3. Faculty of Divinity, University of Cambridge, West Road, Cambridge, CB3 9BS, UK

    Alastair Lockhart

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  1. Ryan J. Williams
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  2. Fraser Watts
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  3. Alastair Lockhart
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Correspondence to Ryan J. Williams.

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Williams, R.J., Watts, F. & Lockhart, A. Health Help-Seeking Behaviour in Spiritual Healing Practice: Records from the Panacea Society’s Healing Department, 1924–1997. J Relig Health 61, 2417–2432 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10943-020-01044-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10943-020-01044-1

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