Linking Spiritual Leadership to Employee Mental Health: The Mediating Role of Transformational Leadership
Author/s: Yusuf Taha Okan
DOI: http://doi.org/10.37898/spiritualpc.1705497
Year: 2025 Vol: 3 Number: 10
Abstract
The present study examines the mediating role of transformational leadership in the relationship between spiritual leadership and employee mental health outcomes – namely depression, anxiety, and stress – among public sector employees in Turkey. A total of 512 participants (56.3% female, 43.8% male) working in various public institutions voluntarily participated in the study. The mean age of the participants was 32.18 years (SD = 8.74), with the majority (55.9%) aged between 20 and 29 years. The data were collected using the Spiritual Leadership Scale, the Transformational Leadership Scale, and the Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scale (DASS-21). The structural equation model was tested using a bootstrap analysis with 5,000 resamples. The findings indicated that transformational leadership had a substantial mediating effect on the association between spiritual leadership and overall psychological distress (DASS-21 total), as well as its constituent components: anxiety, stress, and depression. All indirect effects proved to be significant, with confidence intervals excluding zero, thus confirming the presence of partial mediation. The model demonstrated an adequate fit to the data (CMIN/DF = 2.038, CFI = .996, TLI = .991, RMSEA = .045). The findings of this study underscore the significance of cultivating spiritual and transformational leadership practices to foster employee well-being within the context of the public sector.