Construction of a religious motivation questionnaire

Abstract

The paper describes the construction of a new religious motivation questionnaire. The construction was proceeded by an analysis which revealed that the existing instruments for assessing religious motivation have deficiencies and, most importantly, may not be suitable for use with persons in adolescence or younger. In the first phase of the questionnaire construction, a semi-structured interview was used on a sample of 111 respondents aged 10-25 from Belgrade. The interview findings suggested the presence of religious motivation dimensions which are not contained in the existing instruments. In the second phase, an initial pool of items, formulated based on interview answers, was administered to a sample of 354 secondary school and university students from Belgrade. Principal component analysis revealed five dimensions of religious motivation measured by the constructed questionnaire: religion as ultimate value; religion as a means of wish-fulfillment; religion as a source of emotional well-being; ideals and morality; religion as a part of tradition; and tendency to meet social expectations regarding religion. The questionnaire scales show excellent reliability.