Comparing the Effectiveness of Frameworks for Religious Motivation: A Secondary Data Analysis of Four Seventh-day Adventist Samples

Buller Hall Lobby

My project examines two theoretical frameworks for understanding religious motivation and corresponding instruments, which need to be tested for reliability and consistency. Religious orientation theory defines religious motivation as pursuing religion for either extrinsic or intrinsic reasons. Self-determination theory defines motivation as internalization of religious practices. I examined four surveys of Seventh-day Adventists from 2005 to 2018 that had either a religious orientation scale or a self-determination theory scale. Confirmatory analysis found the structure of the scale to be marginally acceptable and identified problematic items that caused the instruments to be less reliable.