The role of spirituality in the practice of employee assistance programs : a South African experience

Abstract

A quantitative study was carried out through an online survey (using Qualtrics) among South African Employee Assistance Program (EAP) practitioners/professionals in respect of their knowledge, attitudes, and practices regarding spirituality when rendering EAP services. The survey link was distributed to a list of 232 EAP practitioners/professionals as was obtained from the Employee Assistance Professionals Association of South Africa and to an additional 25 email addresses by using snowball sampling totaling 257 respondents. A total of 57 completed responses were received (22% response rate). The respondents indicated positive attitudes toward spirituality and reported that they frequently deal with spiritual matters in practice. However, respondents indicated uncertainty about their own knowledge of levels of spirituality and whether their training was adequate to guide them in good ethical practice.