Date of Award

1972

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts

College

College of Education and International Services

Program

Education, Curriculum and Instruction, MA

First Advisor

W. G. A. Futcher

Second Advisor

Ruth Murdoch

Third Advisor

Conrad Reichart

Abstract

The study had two objectives

(1) to construct an instrument, which would, measure students' attitudes toward God, and

(2) to use the instrument in a small pilot study to test its usefulness.

The instrument was patterned after the format of Osgood's Semantic Differential and each subject was asked to make judgments on five different concepts about God. Each concept was judged by pairs of bipolar adjectives on a rating scale of one to five, with five, being the most-positive.. The thirteen bipolar adjective pairs used in the. final .instrument were used only after two item analyses proved them to be discriminatory in relation to the concepts, The same thirteen scales, all evaluative in nature, were used for each concept.

A factor analysis, using a varimax rotation, yielded two factors which accounted for an average of .75 of the total variance on each factor. Use of Tucker's coefficient of congruence indicated a stability of factor patterns over different scales. Two methods of determining reliability were used. The coefficient alpha reliability rose from a median of .7642 on Form I and .6627 on Form II on the initial administration to .9128 on the final administration. A test-retest reliability study was conducted using sixty-six students. The tests were administered approximately four weeks apart. The reliability of the test-retest, study was .77.

The instrument was submitted to a panel of six individuals, a educators and theologians, who were asked to evaluate the instrument and judge whether or not it appeared to be a valid instrument: for measuring attitudes toward God. All six experts judged the instrument to be valid on the basis of face validity. A small pilot study was conducted to test the usefulness of the. instrument. Various statistical procedures were, used to analyze and compare the data obtained.

Three conclusions were, reached:

(1) an attitude scale for measuring attitudes toward God can be developed;

(2) the development of norms are necessary for ease of interpretation of the data; and

(3) the pilot, study demonstrated the usefulness of the instrument but gave no clue to the sources of attitudes revealed. Implications for further study were also included, along with some precautions.

Subject Area

School children--Religious life; School children--Attitudes; Seventh-day Adventist elementary schools

DOI

https://dx.doi.org/10.32597/theses/149

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