Integrating clients’ religion and spirituality within psychotherapy: A comprehensive meta‐analysis

Some religious or spiritual (R/S) clients seek psychotherapy that integrates R/S values, while others may be reticent to disclose R/S‐related aspects of struggles in a presumably secular setting. We meta‐analyzed 97 outcome studies ( N  = 7,181) examining the efficacy of tailoring treatment to patients’ R/S beliefs and values. We compared the effectiveness of R/S‐tailored psychotherapy with no‐treatment controls, alternate secular treatments, and additive secular treatments. R/S‐adapted psychotherapy resulted in greater improvement in clients’ psychological ( g  = 0.74, p  < 0.000) and spiritual ( g  = 0.74, p  < 0.000) functioning compared with no treatment and non R/S psychotherapies (psychological: g  = 0.33, p  < 0.001; spiritual: g  = 0.43, p  < 0.001). In more rigorous additive studies, R/S‐accommodated psychotherapies were equally effective to standard approaches in reducing psychological distress ( g  = 0.13, p  = 0.258), but resulted in greater spiritual well‐being ( g  = 0.34, p  < 0.000). We feature several clinical examples and conclude with evidence‐based therapeutic practices.