Temporary Perspective in Priests, Nuns and Catholic Seminarists

The relation between religiosity and temporal perspective has been scarcely studied since the emergence of the psychology of religion in the early twentieth century. There is no known study with priests, nuns, and Catholic seminarians about it according to our database search. The objective of the present investigation was to explore if there were differences in the temporal perspective in a sample of catholic priests, nuns, seminarians, and laypeople. Zimbardo Time-Perspective Inventory (ZTPI) scores obtained for 128 subjects, between 18 and 70 years, at total and item level were analyzed using ANOVA. The lay group differs significantly from Catholic priests, nuns, and seminarians in the present hedonistic and fatalist present. The temporal perspective makes it possible to differentiate significantly between the laity and the three groups of Catholic religious for the fatalistic and hedonistic present.