Ms Nasreen Hanifi

Nasreen Hanifi is a Psychologist by profession with 15-years of experience in the field. She is currently the Director of Clinical Services at My Ability Care. Nasreen specialises in the trauma, disability and drug and alcohol sector with drug and alcohol in the Muslim community being the focus of her Master’s thesis. She is also actively involved in the community sector as well serving as the President of Mission of Hope and Director Clinical Operations for Hayat House. At present, she is completing her PhD on compassion and spirituality at CSU and CISAC.

How Muslims use Compassion to Overcome Major Life Crises: A Psycho-spiritual Analysis of Compassion

Compassion is considered a powerful and instinctual emotion. It is a common central thread among many diverse religions and worldviews. However, there is a lack of research on the spiritual aspects of compassion despite it being endorsed as a principle in human-to-human treatment. In response, this study proposes to investigate how Muslims use compassion to overcome major life crises through a psycho-spiritual perspective. The study is qualitative in nature and will use purposive sampling to recruit participants. Neff’s compassion rating scale will be used to determine participants’ level of compassion. A semi-structured interview approach will be used to carry on conversations to elicit rich data. The questions will be framed in a manner that will provide participants with the flexibility and freedom to explore how compassionate they feel or think they are. Mostly open-ended questions will be used throughout the interview to encourage participants to talk freely and respond openly to queries.