Cultural Intelligence and Attitudes Toward Violence on Tendency to Forgive Among Residents of Jos North

This study examined cultural intelligence and attitudes toward violence as predictors of the tendency to forgive among residents of Jos North Local Government Area, Plateau State, Nigeria. A cross-sectional survey design was adopted. The target sample comprised 640 respondents selected through a multistage sampling approach, with field-level adaptations to convenience sampling where systematic selection was impracticable. A total of 615 properly completed questionnaires were returned, representing a response rate of 96.1%. Data were collected using the Cultural Intelligence Scale (CQS), Attitudes Toward Violence Scale (ATVS), and the extended Heartland Forgiveness Scale (HFS-E). The data were analysed using descriptive statistics, multiple regression, and analysis of variance, with significance set at the .05 level. The findings revealed that the four dimensions of cultural intelligence jointly and significantly predicted willingness to forgive, motivation to forgive, ability to forgive, and preference to forgive, explaining 7.4%, 5.0%, 5.8%, and 7.1% of their respective variances. Cognitive and motivational cultural intelligence significantly predicted willingness to forgive, while metacognitive and behavioural cultural intelligence significantly predicted motivation and ability to forgive. For preference to forgive, metacognitive, cognitive, and behavioural cultural intelligence were significant predictors. Furthermore, attitudes toward violence negatively predicted motivation to forgive and ability to forgive, accounting for 0.6% and 2.2% of their respective variances. However, attitudes toward violence did not significantly predict willingness or preference to forgive. The study concludes that cultural intelligence contributes to understanding forgiveness among residents of Jos North, while favourable attitudes toward violence may undermine the motivation and perceived ability to forgive. It was recommended that community-based peacebuilding initiatives promote cultural awareness, perspective-taking, non-violent conflict resolution, and interpersonal reconciliation to strengthen peaceful coexistence in culturally diverse and conflict-affected communities.