Factor Structure of Forgivingness Questionnaire in Iran and its Relation with Mental Health

Objective: The Forgivingness questionnaire has been designed to assessforgivingness in a variety of cultural contexts. This questionnaire was based on common Western conceptualizations of forgiveness. In Western communities, when one is the victim of an intentional offense, a feeling of resentment seems logical. The intensity and duration of this feeling of resentment usually depends on the circumstances of the offense, the attitude of the offender and the personality of the victim. This study explored the factor structure of forgiveness in an Iranian sample and the relationship between forgiveness and mental health among the Iranian participants .
Method: Two hundred ninety two university students participated in this study. The Forgivingness Questionnaire and General Health Questionnaire were used
Results: The forgivingness items indicated Cronbachʹs alpha of .94 for the total scale. An exploratory factor analysis was conducted on the raw data for the whole sample. Using the scree test, three interpretable factors emerged that accounted for %66.34 of the variance. Correlation coefficients between FQ and GHQ (r = -0.59, p< 0.01).
Conclsusion: Our results were consistent with what had been obtained in several European and Asian samples. However, they were different from the findings of Kadiangandu et al., who reported two factors in their Congo sample: revenge versus forgiveness and personal and social circumstances.