Aggression in Young Adults : A Network Analysis Revealing the Central Role of Franciscan-Inspired Spirituality

Kurzfassung/Abstract

Aggression remains a common challenge in young adulthood, yet little is known about how spirituality, forgiveness, and related psychological resources are jointly connected to its different components. This study examined a regularized partial correlation network of life satisfaction, mental well-being, awe/gratitude, nature experience, compassion, Franciscan-inspired spirituality, humility, three dimensions of forgiveness, and four dimensions of aggression among 500 Polish university students aged 19–24 years (58.1% female). Data were collected online in 2024, and the network was estimated using graphical LASSO with extended Bayesian information criterion (EBICglasso). Aggression formed a dense and relatively segregated subnetwork. Franciscan-inspired spirituality was the most strongly connected node, followed by awe/gratitude and humility, but its connectivity reflected links with forgiveness by God, humility, compassion, and awe/gratitude rather than direct associations with aggression. The forgiveness dimensions showed distinct patterns: forgiveness of others was associated with lower physical and verbal aggression, self-forgiveness with lower hostility and higher well-being, and forgiveness by God almost exclusively with Franciscan-inspired spirituality. Strength centrality and edge weights showed good stability, and the network was essentially unchanged after adjustment for age and sex. Overall, spiritual and psychological resources were related to aggression selectively rather than uniformly, suggesting that educational and preventive approaches may be more effective when matched to specific components of aggressive functioning.