Religious Experiences and Their Relations With Happiness and Personality
Three hundred sixty-four adults, of whom 46% were church members, participated in a study of mystical-religious experiences. They also completed measures of happiness; measures of some trait, cognitive and other personality variables; and items intended to form an improved measure of religious affec...
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Contributors: | |
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
|
| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
2000
|
| In: |
The international journal for the psychology of religion
Year: 2000, Volume: 10, Issue: 3, Pages: 157-172 |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Parallel Edition: | Electronic
|
| Summary: | Three hundred sixty-four adults, of whom 46% were church members, participated in a study of mystical-religious experiences. They also completed measures of happiness; measures of some trait, cognitive and other personality variables; and items intended to form an improved measure of religious affect. Church members reported twice as many experiences as nonmembers, and their experiences were predominantly mild. This lends support to Pratt's (1920) prediction that the religious experiences of ordinary churchgoers would be commonplace and mild rather that intense. However, the ratios of mild to intense experiences were similar for church members and nonmembers, and it was not possible to show that greater happiness was associated with the mild experiences of churchgoers, as Pratt also predicted. Analysis of the new measure showed that religious affect comprises Immanent, Social, and Transcendent Factors. The Immanent and Social Factors relate most closely to church membership, whereas the Transcendent factor is associated with mystical experiences. There were few associations between church membership or mystical experiences and the personality variables, and those that were significant were weak. The participants' neuroticism and psychoticism scores provided no support for James's (1902) suggestion that some form of psychological distress is associated with mystical experience. |
|---|---|
| ISSN: | 1532-7582 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: The international journal for the psychology of religion
|
| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1207/S15327582IJPR1003_02 |