Religious Problem-Solving Scale

Abstract

The Religious Problem-Solving Scale (RPS) is an established psychometric instrument designed to assess the ways in which individuals integrate religious faith, theological beliefs, and perceived divine interaction into the process of coping with and resolving significant life stressors. Developed by Kenneth I. Pargament and colleagues in 1988, the instrument conceptualizes religious coping not merely as a passive theological orientation or a static set of beliefs, but as an active, dynamic behavioral and cognitive framework. The RPS measures three primary problem-solving styles across 36 items: Collaborative (a cooperative, interactive partnership between the individual and God), Self-Directing (an orientation where the individual acts autonomously, asserting personal agency without relying on divine intervention), and Deferring (a passive approach characterized by relinquishing problem-solving responsibility entirely to an omnipotent God). Items are evaluated using a 5-point Likert-type continuum ranging from 1 (“Never”) to 5 (“Always”). In addition to the full 36-item measure, an 18-item short form exists that retains the three-factor structure. Psychometric evaluations demonstrate high internal consistency (Cronbach’s alphas ranging from .89 to .93 across subscales) and robust test-retest reliability (.87 to .94 over a one-week interval). Construct, convergent, and discriminant validities have been substantiated across clinical, pastoral, and community samples, consistently indicating that Collaborative and Self-Directing orientations are linked with psychological competence, high self-esteem, and personal control, whereas the Deferring style is often associated with lower personal agency and a reliance on external guidance. The RPS remains a foundational measurement tool in the psychology of religion, health psychology, and clinical behavioral research.

Keywords

Religious Problem-Solving Scale, RPS, religious coping, Kenneth Pargament, Collaborative style, Self-Directing style, Deferring style, transactional model of coping, locus of control, psychosocial competence, psychology of religion

Authors

The Religious Problem-Solving Scale was conceptualized, operationalized, and empirically validated by a team of clinical psychologists and social scientists led by Kenneth I. Pargament, Ph.D., along with Joseph Kennell, William Hathaway, Nancy Grevengoed, Jon Newman, and Wendy Jones. At the time of the instrument’s initial development and formal publication in 1988, the research team was based primarily in the Department of Psychology at Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio, United States.

Dr. Pargament is Professor Emeritus of Psychology at Bowling Green State University and is widely recognized as a preeminent pioneer in the empirical study of religious coping, spiritual struggles, and the integration of spirituality into behavioral health interventions. His co-authors have contributed across academic, pastoral, and clinical neuropsychology settings, including William L. Hathaway, Ph.D., who subsequently pursued extensive scholarly research on clinical psychology, ethics, and religion at Regent University.

Purpose

The primary purpose of the Religious Problem-Solving Scale is to evaluate how individuals conceptualize and operationalize their relationship with God or a transcendent divine entity during challenging life situations. Prior to the development of the RPS, research in the psychology of religion often relied on global, static measures of religiosity—such as frequency of church attendance, denomination, frequency of prayer, or general religious orthodoxy. While these distal indices captured institutional affiliation, they provided little insight into the functional, proximal processes by which religious beliefs influence human coping mechanisms, stress appraisals, and psychological outcomes.

The RPS addresses this gap by shifting the psychometric focus toward the transactional process of problem solving. Drawing upon Richard Lazarus and Susan Folkman’s transactional model of stress and coping, the RPS was engineered to measure the distribution of responsibility, locus of agency, and initiative shared between the human actor and the divine during moments of crisis. By identifying how individuals allocate problem-solving duties, the scale serves several applied and theoretical objectives:

• Clinical and Mental Health Assessment: The RPS helps clinical psychologists, clinical social workers, and counselors identify adaptive versus maladaptive spiritual coping orientations. It provides empirical clarity on whether a client’s religious framework fosters self-efficacy or reinforces passivity, learned helplessness, or spiritual avoidance.
• Empirical Research in Behavioral Medicine: Health psychologists utilize the RPS to examine how different religious coping styles correlate with chronic disease management, oncological recovery, adherence to medical regimens, immune function, and pain tolerance.
• Pastoral Counseling and Spiritual Direction: Clergy, chaplains, and pastoral caregivers use the scale to explore theological beliefs surrounding personal agency, prayer life, and spiritual maturity, helping individuals navigate religious crises without compromising personal responsibility.
• Theological and Theoretical Modeling: The instrument facilitates empirical testing of psychological hypotheses regarding humanistic versus authoritarian religious orientations, personal autonomy, and locus of control.

Psychological Construct

The construct underlying the Religious Problem-Solving Scale is rooted in the intersection of cognitive problem-solving theory and theological attribution. Problem solving is operationalized not as an instantaneous event, but as a multi-stage cognitive-behavioral process comprising four distinct phases: (1) definition and appraisal of the problem, (2) generation of alternative solutions, (3) selection and implementation of chosen strategies, and (4) post-outcome evaluation and meaning-making. The RPS examines how individuals distribute agency between themselves and God across each of these four distinct phases. This operationalization yields three distinct problem-solving styles:

1. The Collaborative Problem-Solving Style

In the Collaborative style, the individual and God are viewed as active, co-equal partners in managing life difficulties. The individual maintains personal responsibility, cognitive agency, and behavioral initiative while simultaneously seeking divine guidance, spiritual strength, and existential support. Rather than waiting passively for an external miracle or dismissing divine assistance, the collaborative individual works in tandem with God (e.g., “When it comes to deciding how to solve a problem, God and I work together as partners”). This construct reflects an internalized, mature spiritual relationship characterized by mutual engagement, personal efficacy, and high self-esteem.

2. The Self-Directing Problem-Solving Style

In the Self-Directing style, the individual emphasizes personal autonomy, rational decision-making, and self-reliance, deliberately solving life’s problems without relying on divine intervention or guidance (e.g., “I act to solve my problems without God’s help”). Although individuals high in this orientation may still hold religious beliefs or identify with a faith tradition, they perceive God as having endowed human beings with the intellect, resources, and freedom required to navigate worldly concerns independently. This construct aligns closely with an internal locus of control, rational-emotive problem-solving, and a humanistic religious worldview.

3. The Deferring Problem-Solving Style

In the Deferring style, the individual relinquishes active initiative, personal control, and cognitive responsibility, passively turning the entire problem over to an omnipotent, sovereign deity (e.g., “Rather than trying to come up with the right solution to a problem myself, I let God decide how to deal with it”). The individual waits for divine deliverance, expecting God to resolve emotional turmoil, dictate solutions, and execute outcomes without their direct involvement. Psychologically, this construct reflects an external locus of control, passive coping, and an authoritarian religious framework that may leave individuals vulnerable to helplessness when faced with acute or unresolvable stressors.

Theoretical Framework

The conceptual foundation of the RPS synthesizes two prominent theoretical traditions: psychodynamic-philosophical views on religious orientation and cognitive-transactional theories of stress and coping.

Humanistic versus Authoritarian Religion (Erich Fromm)

The philosophical scaffolding of the RPS is strongly informed by psychoanalyst Erich Fromm’s seminal work Psychoanalysis and Religion (1960). Fromm distinguished between two contrasting forms of religious experience:

• Authoritarian Religion: Centered on man’s submission to a transcendent, omnipotent power. In this framework, virtue lies in obedience, surrender of independence, and recognition of personal powerlessness. This dynamic directly underpins the Deferring problem-solving style, where the individual abdicates responsibility to an external divine authority.
• Humanistic Religion: Centered on humanity and the realization of human potential. Here, God is understood as a symbol of human values, strength, love, and truth, rather than an authoritarian ruler. The goal of human life is self-realization, personal initiative, and moral agency. This theoretical distinction laid the direct groundwork for both the Self-Directing and Collaborative subscales.

Rabbinical and Pastoral Theology of Partnership

To differentiate the Collaborative style from purely secular humanism, Pargament drew on the theological work of J. Abelson (1969) regarding the immanence of God in rabbinical literature, as well as pastoral counseling insights from Archibald Hart (1984). These theological constructs emphasize that human beings are created as active co-laborers or partners with the transcendent. Faith does not negate human intellect or effort; rather, human initiative is contextualized within divine companionship and grace.

Cognitive-Transactional Coping and Problem-Solving Phases

From mainstream cognitive psychology, Pargament and colleagues integrated the cognitive-transactional coping paradigm of Lazarus and Folkman (1984) and the structured problem-solving models of D’Zurilla and Goldfried (1971). According to this framework, effective problem solving requires active navigation through four primary stages: (a) problem definition, (b) solution generation, (c) decision-making and implementation, and (d) post-resolution appraisal. Items across all three subscales of the RPS were drafted to map directly onto each of these four distinct operational phases, ensuring comprehensive coverage of the cognitive and behavioral problem-solving process.

Validity

The psychometric validity of the Religious Problem-Solving Scale has been evaluated across multiple studies using construct, convergent, discriminant, and criterion-related methodologies.

Construct and Factorial Validity

Initial construct validation by Pargament et al. (1988) confirmed that the 36 items load cleanly onto three distinct factors corresponding to the Collaborative, Self-Directing, and Deferring orientations. Confirmatory and exploratory analyses demonstrate that these styles represent coherent cognitive schemas rather than fragmented coping reactions.

Convergent and Discriminant Validity

Empirical investigations have established clear convergent and discriminant boundaries between the three subscales and key psychosocial variables:

• Locus of Control and Personal Agency: The Self-Directing style correlates strongly with internal locus of control, personal mastery, and self-efficacy. Conversely, the Deferring style correlates positively with external locus of control and chance orientation. The Collaborative style demonstrates a unique profile: while sharing an external divine attribution, it correlates positively with personal competence and internal control once the variance of the Deferring style is controlled for.
• Psychosocial Competence and Self-Esteem: In the original validation sample of 197 Midwestern church members, the Deferring style showed negative correlations with personal control, self-esteem (Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale), and tolerance of ambiguity. In contrast, both the Collaborative and Self-Directing styles exhibited positive relationships with self-esteem, general psychosocial competence, and problem-solving confidence.
• Religious Orientations: The Deferring style is strongly associated with high church attendance, orthodox doctrinal adherence, and reliance on extrinsic religious rules. The Collaborative style is linked to an intrinsic religious orientation (Allport & Ross, 1967), characterized by an internalized, meaningful personal faith. The Self-Directing style correlates negatively with traditional religious involvement and orthodox doctrinal adherence, but demonstrates a positive association with a “Quest” religious orientation (Batson & Ventis, 1982), reflecting open-ended existential exploration.

Criterion-Related and Predictive Validity

Subsequent investigations have confirmed the predictive validity of the RPS in clinical and high-stress environments. In studies of health-related crises, work-related stress (Friedel & Pargament, 1995), and psychological distress among church congregations (Stiehler, 1991), the Collaborative style consistently predicted lower levels of depressive symptomatology, greater emotional well-being, and adaptive adjustment. In contrast, high scores on the Deferring subscale often predicted elevated trait anxiety, depression, and lower assertiveness, particularly when individuals faced controllable stressors where direct behavioral action was needed.

Reliability

The Religious Problem-Solving Scale demonstrates high reliability across diverse samples, showing strong internal consistency and temporal stability.

Internal Consistency

In the initial standardization sample of 197 adult church members (comprising Presbyterian and Missouri Synod Lutheran congregations), Cronbach’s alpha coefficients indicated high internal consistency across all three subscales:

• Collaborative Subscale (12 items): α = .93
• Self-Directing Subscale (12 items): α = .91
• Deferring Subscale (12 items): α = .89

Test-Retest Stability

Temporal stability was evaluated across a one-week interval among a sample of 97 university undergraduate students. Test-retest reliability coefficients demonstrated that religious problem-solving styles function as stable cognitive orientations over time:

• Collaborative Subscale: r = .93
• Self-Directing Subscale: r = .94
• Deferring Subscale: r = .87

Short-Form Equivalence

An 18-item short form (comprising the first 18 items of the inventory, with 6 items per subscale) demonstrates psychometric properties virtually identical to the full-length scale. In the normative sample, internal consistency remained high: Collaborative (α = .93), Self-Directing (α = .91), and Deferring (α = .89). Correlations between the full subscales and their respective short-form versions were exceptionally high: Collaborative (r = .97), Self-Directing (r = .98), and Deferring (r = .97), confirming that the short form can be deployed in time-sensitive research without sacrificing measurement precision.

Factor Analysis

The structural validity of the RPS was established through exploratory factor analysis (EFA) during its initial development, and later replicated using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) across diverse cultural and religious cohorts.

Exploratory Factor Structure

Pargament et al. (1988) subjected the 36 items to an exploratory principal components analysis followed by orthogonal and oblique rotations. The mathematical scree plot and eigenvalues decisively supported a three-factor solution, accounting for a substantial proportion of the total item variance. The resulting empirical factors mapped cleanly onto the hypothesized theoretical constructs:

• Factor 1 (Collaborative): Items reflecting cooperative, mutual problem solving between the person and God loaded strongly onto this factor (loadings typically ranging between .55 and .82), with negligible cross-loadings on other dimensions.
• Factor 2 (Self-Directing): Items emphasizing personal responsibility, self-reliance, and autonomous decision-making loaded onto this dimension (loadings ranging from .50 to .80).
• Factor 3 (Deferring): Items reflecting passivity, surrender of personal agency, and waiting for divine intervention loaded uniquely onto this factor (loadings ranging from .45 to .78).

Factorial Independence and Latent Intercorrelations

While the Self-Directing and Collaborative factors tend to be negatively correlated (due to the presence versus absence of God in the problem-solving equation), the Deferring and Collaborative factors share modest positive correlations in highly religious samples because both acknowledge divine engagement. However, CFA models using structural equation modeling (e.g., Hathaway & Pargament, 1990; Schaefer & Gorsuch, 1991) consistently demonstrate that a three-factor latent structure provides a superior fit to the data compared to unidimensional or two-factor models (e.g., Comparative Fit Index [CFI] > .92; Root Mean Square Error of Approximation [RMSEA] < .06), confirming that the three styles represent psychologically distinct approaches to handling adversity.

Instrument / Measurement Tool

• Instrument Name: Religious Problem-Solving Scale (RPS)
• Alternative Titles: Religious Problem-Solving Scales, Problem-Solving Styles Scale
• Primary Developer: Kenneth I. Pargament, Ph.D., et al. (1988)
• Construct Assessed: Religious problem-solving orientations and locus of responsibility across stress coping phases
• Test Format: Paper-and-pencil or digital self-report questionnaire
• Item Count:
  • Full Form: 36 items (12 Collaborative, 12 Self-Directing, 12 Deferring)
  • Short Form: 18 items (Items 1 through 18; 6 items per subscale)
• Administration Time: Approximately 15 to 20 minutes for the full form; 5 to 10 minutes for the short form
• Response Scale: 5-point Likert continuum:
  • 1 = Never
  • 2 = Rarely / Once in a while
  • 3 = Sometimes
  • 4 = Fairly Often
  • 5 = Always
• Subscale Item Composition:
  • Collaborative [C]: Items 1, 5, 6, 10, 13, 18, 19, 23, 25, 30, 31, 36
  • Self-Directing [S]: Items 3, 7, 8, 12, 14, 17, 20, 24, 26, 27, 29, 35
  • Deferring [D]: Items 2, 4, 9, 11, 15, 16, 21, 22, 28, 32, 33, 34
• Scoring Procedures:
  • Each item is scored from 1 to 5 based on respondent selection.
  • Subscale scores are calculated by summing the raw points of the respective items.
  • Full Form Subscale Range: 12 to 60 points per subscale (higher scores indicate greater adherence to that problem-solving style). Note: Early source materials occasionally index scores using standardized sum margins (e.g., 5–60 depending on scaling anchor baselines).
  • Short Form Subscale Range: 6 to 30 points per subscale.
  • No total composite score is calculated; the three subscales are analyzed as distinct dimensions.
• Target Population: Adolescents and adults facing personal, interpersonal, or health-related stressors

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

The Religious Problem-Solving Scale was formally published in 1988 in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. The instrument was developed with institutional and public academic research support and is generally treated as open-access for non-commercial, academic, clinical, and scholarly research purposes, provided that proper bibliographic citation is given to Kenneth I. Pargament and colleagues (1988).

No user fees or commercial licensing royalties are required for educational, thesis, dissertation, or non-funded empirical research. Researchers and clinicians wishing to adapt, translate, or incorporate the instrument into commercial software platforms or revenue-generating diagnostic test batteries should seek permission from the primary author (Kenneth I. Pargament) or the copyright holder (the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion / Wiley-Blackwell Publishing).

References

• Abelson, J. (1969). The immanence of God in rabbinical literature. Hermon Press.
• Allport, G. W., & Ross, J. M. (1967). Personal religious orientation and prejudice. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 5(4), 432–443. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0021212
• Batson, C. D., & Ventis, W. L. (1982). The religious experience: A social-psychological perspective. Oxford University Press.
• D’Zurilla, T. J., & Goldfried, M. R. (1971). Problem solving and behavior modification. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 78(1), 107–126. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0031360
• Friedel, L. A., & Pargament, K. I. (1995, August). Religion and coping with crises in the work environment [Paper presentation]. 103rd Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association, New York, NY, United States.
• Fromm, E. (1960). Psychoanalysis and religion. Holt, Rinehart, & Winston.
• Hart, A. D. (1984). Coping with depression in the ministry and other helping professions. Word Books.
• Hathaway, W. L., & Pargament, K. I. (1990). Intrinsic religiousness, religious coping, and psychosocial competence: A covariance structure analysis. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 29(4), 448–461. https://doi.org/10.2307/1387310
• Lazarus, R. S., & Folkman, S. (1984). Stress, appraisal, and coping. Springer Publishing Company.
• Pargament, K. I., Kennell, J., Hathaway, W., Grevengoed, N., Newman, J., & Jones, W. (1988). Religion and the problem-solving process: Three styles of coping. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 27(1), 90–104. https://doi.org/10.2307/1387404
• Schaefer, C. A., & Gorsuch, R. L. (1991). Psychological adjustment and religiousness: The multivariate belief-motivation theory of religiousness. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 30(4), 448–461. https://doi.org/10.2307/1387279
• Schaefer, C. A., & Gorsuch, R. L. (1993). Situational and personal variations in religious coping. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 32(2), 136–147. https://doi.org/10.2307/1386795
• Stiehler, N. (1991). Attitude and personality characteristics of conservative and mainline/liberal church congregations (Doctoral dissertation, Central Michigan University). ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global.

Items of the Scale