|
Article Excerpt
During the last 40 years, researchers have studied the relationship between psychological development and religion (see Worthington, 1989 for an extensive review of the literature regarding psychological and religious development). For example, studies have investigated religious practice from the perspective of Piaget's theory of cognitive development both in children (Elkind, 1964; Long, Elkind, & Spilka, 1967) and in adolescents (Allport, Gillespie, & Young, 1948; Goldman, 1964; Pealting, 1974). Other studies have examined the relationship between religion and moral development (Bull, 1969; Clouse, 1978), Erikson's theory of psychosocial development in children (Steele, 1986) and in adults (Whitehead & Whitehead, 1979), and transition theory (Hall, 1986; Spero, 1987). Although these authors have not concluded that religious development is a necessary part of psychological development, research over the years has established a connection between these two dimensions for those who profess religious belief.
More recently, attention has been given to the ways in which race and culture influence the development of beliefs, attitudes, behaviors, and values. In particular, Helms (1984, 1990c, 1990d, 1995) has proposed models of racial identity development for people of color and for Whites that seek to describe the psychological experience of race for each and to anticipate how differing racial identity statuses will affect individuals' cognitions and behaviors in a variety of settings, for instance, in counseling dyads (Carter, 1995; Helms, 1984, 1990a), in organizations (Kirkland & Regan, 1997), and in families (Gushue & Sciarra, 1995). Racial identity theory has become a significant and influential framework for understanding an individual's psychological development in a society that is becoming increasingly aware of its racial diversity.
Another recent development has been a keen interest in issues of spirituality and religion as part of the counseling process (Holt, Houg, & Romano, 1999; Kelly, 1995; Worthington, Kurusu, McCullough, & Sandage, 1996; Zinnbauer & Pargament, 2000). Some see this appreciation as an aspect of multicultural awareness (Pate & Bondi, 1992). The Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs (CACREP), in the latest 2001 standards, requires counselor education programs to show how their curricula deal with religious and spiritual development. Burke et al. (1999) have suggested ways in which spiritual and religious issues can be integrated throughout the CACREP core curriculum. Within the common core area of Human Growth and Development, these authors have suggested an examination of the "connections between the major domains of human development (e.g., cognitive, psychosocial, moral) and the development of spiritual/religious belief and practice" (Burke et al., 1999, p. 252). These authors have further proposed that one of the ways to understand this connection is through research that focuses on spiritual and religious development, while Zinnbauer and Pargament (2000) have called for research examining various approaches to religion and spirituality.
Although the terms are often used interchangeably, the distinction between spirituality and religion is an important one. Richards and Bergin (1997) defined spirituality as "experiences, beliefs, and phenomena that pertain to the transcendent and existential aspects of life" (p. 13), in contrast to religion, which they describe as "theistic beliefs, practices, and feelings that are often, but not always, expressed institutionally and denominationally as well as personally" (p. 13). These definitions express the strong interrelationship between spirituality and religion, whereby the latter can be seen as a subset of the former. This study, in agreement with Burke et al. (1999), uses both terms according to the definitions just cited (Richards & Bergin, 1997).
As practitioners continue to give more serious consideration to issues of race and religion in the counseling process, there is need for research that examines the relationship between these two fundamental dimensions of human experience. As previously noted, recent research in counseling has emphasized the importance of examining socioracial development as a seminal aspect both of an individual's psychological growth and of the counseling process itself. Yet despite the recent interest in religion noted in the preceding paragraphs, there has been little research to date on how socioracial development may find expression in a person's religious life. The present study examines how the particular dimension of psychosocial development described by racial identity theory may be related to religious motivation (intrinsic versus extrinsic religion) and how religious beliefs are held (quest versus fundamentalism). The following sections offer a brief overview of racial identity and psychological orientations to religion.
RACIAL IDENTITY DEVELOPMENT
Helms (1984, 1990c, 1990d, 1995) proposed models of racial identity to describe an individual's psychological development in response to his or her socioracial environment. Helms (1995) suggested a number of sequential, yet permeable, ego-identity statuses for both Blacks and Whites. Each status represents a cluster of attitudes, beliefs, and values that affects how an individual perceives the world and influences the way he or she processes information about race (see Gushue & Carter, 2000). The sequential ordering of the statuses reflects increasing complexity and flexibility in the processing of racially related information. According to Helms (1995), at any given time in an individual's life, one status will usually predominate, although some characteristics of other statuses may be present. The tasks and challenges of each lower status must be resolved before an individual can progress to the next. However, in a particular situation, an individual may revert from his or her current predominant status to a lower one. For Whites, Helms (1990d) has proposed two fundamental processes underlying the development of increasingly more complex and integrated racial identity ego statuses: the abandonment of racism (Contact, Disintegration, and Reintegration statuses) and the development of a positive White racial identity (Pseudo-Independence, Immersion/Emersion, and Autonomy). The content of each of the statuses has been described at length in the literature (e.g., Carter, 1995; Helms, 1990d, 1995).
Table 1 provides a brief description of Helms's (1990d, 1995) six White racial identity statuses, their implications for information processing, and an illustration of how each status might be expressed in the religious sphere. Helms (1990d, 1995) linked the varying racial identity statuses to differences in beliefs, attitudes, and values. Thus, a racial identity ego-status marked by openness to a variety of perspectives and cognitive flexibility may be related to a form of religious belief that also reflects those same qualities. It might then be hypothesized that evolution in racial identity may also be reflected in changes in the spirituality of a religious person. This is not to say that a person would necessarily change religious denominations. Rather, these changes might be noted in two ways. First, they might affect which aspects of his or her belief system are most salient. Thus a person with a more developed racial identity status might place greater emphasis on the explicitly social implications of his or her faith (i.e., love of neighbor, teachings about justice, etc.). Second, and the focus of this study, growth in racial identity might be related to a change in the way in which a person believes (i.e., religious orientation). For instance, if a person uses the information processing strategy of "obliviousness" associated with the Contact status, it seems plausible that he or she might also be oblivious to racism within his or her religious community. Moreover, this same person might also demonstrate a religious orientation that reflects his or her orientation to race and societal racism, for example, acceptance of current religious teachings (the status quo) as immutable truths. Similarly, if one's information processing about race is influenced by what Helms (1995) called "selective perception and negative outgroup distortion" (p. 185; associated with the Reintegration status), his or her cognitive processing in the religious sphere may reflect similar distortions. Such a person might believe in the inherent superiority of his or her religious tradition or, conversely, demonstrate a tendency to denigrate other faiths. In an extreme case, he or she might find a theological rationale for acceptance of racial inequities (e.g., accepting the consequences of racial oppression as "God's will"). To...
|
