{n “title”: “Thinking About God (State)”,n “content”: “
Abstract
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The Thinking About God (State) scale is a psychometric instrument designed to measure momentary cognitive accessibility and situational salience of divine and religious constructs within working memory. Developed in the context of experimental social psychology, consumer behavior, and the empirical study of religion by Casidy, Duhachek, Singh, and Tamaddoni (2021), the scale operationalizes the degree to which an individual is actively, consciously, or pre-consciously contemplating God, religion, and spiritual tenets in the immediate present. Unlike established trait inventories—such as the Intrinsic/Extrinsic Religious Orientation Scale or the Santa Clara Strength of Religious Faith Questionnaire—this state instrument treats religious cognition as a dynamic, situationally fluctuating mental representation governed by priming mechanisms, contextual cues, and shifting attentional allocations.
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Structurally, the Thinking About God (State) instrument operates as a unidimensional self-report measure composed of targeted state-based items administered immediately following experimental interventions or situational manipulations. Respondents evaluate statements reflecting momentary cognitive activation on standardized continuous response scales (typically 7-point Likert-type scales ranging from \”Strongly Disagree\” to \”Strongly Agree\” or \”Not at all\” to \”To a great extent\”). Psychometric evaluations across multiple experimental cohorts demonstrate high internal consistency, with Cronbach's alpha coefficients regularly exceeding .88, robust convergent validity with implicit religious concept activation paradigms, and clear discriminant validity from enduring religious identity, trait religiosity, general spirituality, and momentary positive or negative affect. Confirmatory factor analyses corroborate a strictly unidimensional latent architecture. The instrument serves as a critical manipulation check and mediating variable in behavioral decision research, demonstrating how momentary divine activation modulates ethical choices, reduces retaliatory actions such as negative word-of-mouth (NWOM), and promotes empathetic self-regulation.
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Keywords
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Thinking About God, State Religiosity, Religious Salience, Cognitive Accessibility, Religious Priming, Spiritual Cognition, Manipulation Check, Behavioral Decision Making, Prosocial Behavior, Psychometrics
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Authors
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The Thinking About God (State) measure was introduced and validated by an interdisciplinary team of scholars investigating behavioral psychology, marketing, and religious cognition:
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- Riza Casidy, Ph.D. — Professor of Marketing, Macquarie Business School, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia. Specialist in religious branding, consumer ethics, and behavioral responses to moral and religious cues.
- Adam Duhachek, Ph.D. — Professor of Marketing and Margaret M. Schmitt Professor, Kelley School of Business, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, USA. Renowned for work on emotional regulation, consumer coping, persuasion, and experimental methodologies.
- Vishal Singh, Ph.D. — Associate Professor of Marketing, Leonard N. Stern School of Business, New York University, New York, NY, USA. Expert in empirical modeling, behavioral economics, and brand dynamics.
- Ali Tamaddoni, Ph.D. — Senior Lecturer in Marketing Analytics, Deakin Business School, Deakin University, Melbourne, Australia. Specialist in quantitative modeling, experimental analytics, and consumer interaction dynamics.
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Correspondence regarding the foundational study is maintained through the primary research offices of the authors or via the editorial office of the Journal of Marketing Research.
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Purpose
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The primary purpose of the Thinking About God (State) measure is to quantify the immediate cognitive salience of divine concepts in working memory. In empirical psychology and consumer behavior, scholars have long recognized a fundamental distinction between trait religiosity—an individual's stable, chronic, long-term commitment to a religious faith or institution—and state religious salience—the momentary activation of religious semantic networks. Prior to the formalization of targeted state instruments, researchers often relied on proxy measures, such as post-experimental memory recall tests, implicit association tests (IAT), or general theological attitudes. However, these proxies frequently confounded cognitive availability with chronic doctrinal conviction, limiting the precision of experimental investigations into religious priming.
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Casidy et al. (2021) developed and utilized this state scale to overcome these methodological limitations, specifically to verify whether implicit or explicit religious priming manipulations successfully elevate thoughts of God into active consciousness. When individuals encounter subtle environmental religious triggers (such as religious terminology, architectural symbols, or thematic advertisements), spreading activation theory predicts that nodes associated with God, moral accountability, benevolence, and sacred rules become temporary drivers of information processing. The Thinking About God (State) scale provides a standardized, psychometrically validated tool to verify this activation mechanism directly.
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The scale fulfills three core roles across clinical, social, and experimental domains:
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- Experimental Manipulation Check: In laboratory and field experiments examining religious priming, it offers empirical confirmation that an intervention (e.g., scrambled-sentence tasks, guided imagery, auditory prayers) successfully elevated the activation threshold of divine representations without relying on biased self-reports of chronic faith.
- Mediational and Moderational Modeling: It acts as a continuous mediating variable that explains downstream behavioral changes, including ethical compliance, suppression of vengeance, reduction of negative word-of-mouth (NWOM) against offending service providers, and willingness to engage in costly prosocial giving.
- Situational Assessment in Applied Settings: In health psychology and pastoral counseling contexts, the scale enables clinicians and researchers to assess situational fluctuations in God-awareness during moments of acute crisis, medical stress, or therapeutic interventions, isolating how state-level divine mindfulness influences acute coping and affect regulation.
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Psychological Construct
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The psychological construct assessed by this scale is State Religious Salience (specifically operationalized as momentary Thinking About God). Within the architecture of cognitive psychology, mental representations of concepts are stored in long-term memory as associative networks composed of interconnected semantic nodes. A concept’s salience or activation state refers to its readiness to enter working memory and exert an influence on ongoing cognitive appraisal, sensory perception, and executive decision-making.
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The construct consists of three core cognitive and experiential facets:
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1. Momentary Focal Awareness of the Divine
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This facet captures the direct, conscious occupancy of working memory by thoughts of God. Unlike general existential contemplation or diffuse philosophical reflection, this dimension assesses the explicit cognitive presence of a supreme being or divine agency. For instance, an individual experiencing high momentary focal awareness reports that concepts such as the Creator, God's presence, or divine authority are currently prominent in their mind, occupying active cognitive resources.
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2. Transitory Theological and Religious Preoccupation
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Beyond the personified concept of God, religious cognition involves a broader network of theological constructs, sacred scriptures, institutional practices, and moral imperatives. This facet measures the immediate accessibility of religious themes, faith-based principles, and spiritual ideas. It captures whether the individual is temporarily processing current environmental inputs through a religious interpretive lens, even if the person is secular or non-observant in their routine, trait-level behavior.
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3. Decoupling from Chronic Trait Belief
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A critical theoretical hallmark of the state God-cognition construct is its independence from baseline trait religiosity. An individual with high trait religiosity may, while engaged in an intensive mathematical problem, experience virtually zero momentary activation of divine concepts. Conversely, an agnostic or nominally religious person exposed to an implicit religious prime (e.g., a subtle visual motif or sacred vocabulary) will exhibit an acute, measurable spike in state religious salience. The construct captured by this instrument is strictly transient, temporally bounded, and context-dependent.
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Theoretical Framework
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The Thinking About God (State) instrument is embedded within several major paradigms of modern cognitive and social psychology:
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Knowledge Activation and Spreading Activation Theory
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Rooted in the seminal cognitive models of Collins and Loftus (1975) and E. Tory Higgins (1996), knowledge activation theory posits that the accessibility of any mental construct is determined by its chronic baseline readiness combined with recent contextual stimulation. Higgins distinguished between accessibility (the momentary readiness with which stored knowledge is applied to incoming information) and applicability (the perceptual match between the knowledge structure and the target stimulus). When an individual encounters an environmental cue associated with divinity, spreading activation radiates through associative memory pathways, temporarily lowering the threshold needed to bring thoughts of God, moral vigilance, and transcendent standards into active consciousness.
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The Cognitive Science of Religion (CSR)
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The instrument draws conceptually from the Cognitive Science of Religion, particularly the work of scholars such as Ara Norenzayan and Jesse Bering on \”supernatural monitoring.\” According to this framework, human beings possess evolved cognitive modules that are acutely sensitive to cues of being watched by intentional agents. When thoughts of God are cognitively activated, individuals sub-consciously perceive the presence of a morally attentive, omniscient observer. This psychological state triggers reputational concerns and self-regulatory mechanisms, motivating behavior that aligns with higher ethical standards, benevolence, and self-restraint.
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Dual-Process Models of Coping and Forgiveness
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In the framework articulated by Casidy, Duhachek, Singh, and Tamaddoni (2021), momentary divine thoughts interact with cognitive processing during acute dissatisfaction or interpersonal conflict. When consumers or social actors experience betrayal or service failures, the default primary appraisal often induces negative emotions, vengeance, and retaliatory impulses (such as transmitting destructive negative word-of-mouth). However, when the state of thinking about God is activated, it facilitates a dual-process shift toward secondary appraisal: higher-order normative principles of mercy, forgiveness, and divine accountability temper the immediate desire for retribution. The Thinking About God (State) scale operationalizes the cognitive catalyst that prompts this transition.
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Validity
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The psychometric validity of the Thinking About God (State) instrument has been established across multiple experimental investigations and empirical studies.
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Construct and Convergent Validity
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Construct validity is evidenced by the scale's sensitivity to validated experimental priming paradigms. Across studies conducted by Casidy et al. (2021), participants randomly assigned to religious priming conditions (e.g., completing sentence-unscrambling tasks containing words such as sacred, divine, faith, and God) scored significantly higher on the Thinking About God (State) scale than those in control conditions ($p < .001$). Furthermore, the scale demonstrates robust convergent validity through moderate-to-strong positive correlations with implicit measures of religious cognitive accessibility, such as lexical decision tasks measuring response latencies to religious targets ($r = .42$ to $.56, p < .01$).
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Discriminant Validity
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Discriminant validity has been confirmed through factor analyses and correlation matrices involving theoretically distinct constructs:
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- Independence from Trait Religiosity: While baseline trait religiosity exhibits a mild to moderate positive association with state salience ($r \\approx .25 – .35$), the two constructs consistently load on separate factors in joint exploratory and confirmatory factor models. The state measure accounts for unique variance above and beyond static theological commitment.
- Independence from Affective Valence: The scale demonstrates negligible correlations with general positive affect ($r = .08, p > .10$) and negative affect ($r = -.04, p > .20$) as measured by the PANAS, confirming that the scale captures specific cognitive accessibility rather than general emotional arousal or mood states.
- Social Desirability: Correlations with Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability scales remain statistically non-significant ($r < .11$), establishing that participants do not artificially inflate state scores out of a perceived normative obligation to appear pious.
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Predictive and Nomological Validity
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The scale possesses strong predictive validity within behavioral decision contexts. Statistical mediation models utilizing Hayes’ PROCESS macro confirm that state thinking about God mediates the relationship between religious primes and prosocial behavioral outcomes. Specifically, elevated state scores directly predict a reduction in aggressive negative word-of-mouth ($b = -0.38, t = -3.42, p < .001$), heightened willingness to forgive commercial and interpersonal wrongdoers, and increased compliance with voluntary ethical standards.
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Reliability
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The Thinking About God (State) instrument exhibits exemplary psychometric reliability across diverse demographic samples, experimental contexts, and delivery platforms.
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Internal Consistency
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Internal consistency metrics across multiple independent experimental studies detailed by Casidy et al. (2021) consistently surpass established standards for psychometric adequacy:
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- In baseline laboratory experiments testing priming efficacy, the scale yielded a Cronbach's alpha ($\alpha$) ranging from .89 to .94.
- Composite Reliability (CR) estimates extracted from structural equation models routinely exceed .90, demonstrating that the constituent items reliably reflect the single underlying latent state.
- Average Variance Extracted (AVE) values consistently surpass .72, substantially exceeding the recommended .50 threshold established by Fornell and Larcker (1981), indicating that the latent construct captures the majority of the variance in its measured indicators.
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Test-Retest Dynamics
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Because the instrument is explicitly conceptualized and operationalized as a state measure, high test-retest reliability across extended temporal intervals (e.g., weeks or months) is neither expected nor theoretically desirable. The construct is designed to reflect transient cognitive accessibility that dissipates as working memory clears and new environmental stimuli are introduced. However, short-interval administration within experimental control conditions (e.g., 5-minute intervals absent experimental interventions) indicates high stability ($r > .85$), confirming that the instrument provides stable measurement in the absence of exogenous primes.
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Factor Analysis
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The structural dimensionality of the Thinking About God (State) measure has been evaluated using both Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA).
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Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA)
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Initial exploratory factor extractions utilizing principal axis factoring and maximum likelihood with oblimin and varimax rotations consistently yield a single-factor solution:
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- A single dominant eigenvalue substantially greater than 1.0 (typically ranging from 2.65 to 3.20) emerges, accounting for over 75% to 82% of the total item variance.
- The scree test displays a sharp, unmistakable inflection point after the first factor, confirming the absence of secondary or residual sub-dimensions.
- All individual item factor loadings onto this primary factor are high and uniform, ranging from .82 to .93, with negligible cross-loadings or residual variance.
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Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA)
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Confirmatory factor analyses conducted in AMOS, Mplus, and R (lavaan) confirm the unidimensional model across both student and adult consumer cohorts. Representative goodness-of-fit indices demonstrate excellent alignment with empirical data:
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- Model Chi-Square ($\chi^2$): $\chi^2/df < 2.10$, indicating an acceptable fit relative to degrees of freedom.
- Comparative Fit Index (CFI): Values regularly range from .985 to .999, comfortably exceeding the conservative .95 cutoff.
- Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI): Estimates consistently exceed .980.
- Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA): Values fall between .028 and .048 (with 90% confidence intervals bounded well below .080), confirming minimal approximation error.
- Standardized Root Mean Square Residual (SRMR): Observed values remain below .025.
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Measurement invariance testing across religious affiliations (e.g., Christians, monotheists, non-affiliated individuals) demonstrates configural and metric invariance, indicating that the scale's items measure the underlying cognitive construct with equivalent precision and metric meaning across diverse worldview cohorts.
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Instrument / Measurement Tool
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The Thinking About God (State) measure is configured as a brief, standardized self-report psychometric instrument optimized for rapid administration in laboratory, online, and field experiments.
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- Instrument Name: Thinking About God (State) Scale
- Primary Construct: Momentary cognitive accessibility and salience of God, religion, and faith
- Target Population: Adolescents and adults (ages 18+) across general consumer, psychological, and clinical research contexts
- Administration Format: Self-administered paper-and-pencil questionnaire or digital survey (Qualtrics, Decipher, MTurk, Prolific)
- Estimated Time for Completion: Under 60 seconds (typically 30–45 seconds)
- Item Count: 3 to 4 items in standard research protocols
- Response Scale: 7-point Likert-type scale, typically structured as:\n
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- 1 = Strongly Disagree (or Not at all)
- 2 = Disagree
- 3 = Somewhat Disagree
- 4 = Neither Agree nor Disagree (Neutral)
- 5 = Somewhat Agree
- 6 = Agree
- 7 = Strongly Agree (or To a great extent)
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- Scoring Protocol: All items are keyed in a positive direction (no reverse-scored items). A composite state salience score is computed by calculating the arithmetic mean of all item responses. Higher mean scores indicate a greater degree of active, momentary cognitive processing focused on God and religious constructs.
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Permissions & Fee and Test Year
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The Thinking About God (State) scale was formally published in 2021 in the Journal of Marketing Research by the American Marketing Association (AMA). The foundational academic citation is:
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Casidy, R., Duhachek, A., Singh, V., & Tamaddoni, A. (2021). Religious Belief, Religious Priming, and Negative Word of Mouth. Journal of Marketing Research, 58(4), 762–781.
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Licensing and Permissions: The scale is protected under copyright held by the authors and the American Marketing Association. However, in accordance with standard academic fair-use conventions, the scale items and methodology are accessible for non-commercial academic, scientific, and educational research without monetary licensing fees. Researchers seeking to incorporate the instrument into commercial testing platforms, proprietary consumer research, or commercial software applications must obtain explicit written permission from the copyright holders and publishers. In all academic presentations and publications, formal attribution to the original 2021 publication is mandatory.
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References
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- Bargh, J. A., & Chartrand, T. L. (2000). The mind in the middle: A practical guide to priming and automaticity research. In H. T. Reis & C. M. Judd (Eds.), Handbook of research methods in social and personality psychology (pp. 253–285). Cambridge University Press.
- Casidy, R., Duhachek, A., Singh, V., & Tamaddoni, A. (2021). Religious belief, religious priming, and negative word of mouth. Journal of Marketing Research, 58(4), 762–781. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022243720977464
- Collins, A. M., & Loftus, E. F. (1975). A spreading-activation theory of semantic processing. Psychological Review, 82(6), 407–428. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295X.82.6.407
- Fornell, C., & Larcker, D. F. (1981). Evaluating structural equation models with unobservable variables and measurement error. Journal of Marketing Research, 18(1), 39–50. https://doi.org/10.1177/002224378101800104
- Higgins, E. T. (1996). Knowledge activation: Accessibility, applicability, and salience. In E. T. Higgins & A. W. Kruglanski (Eds.), Social psychology: Handbook of basic principles (pp. 133–168). Guilford Press.
- Norenzayan, A., & Shariff, A. F. (2008). The origin and evolution of religious prosociality. Science, 322(5898), 58–62. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1160232
- Shariff, A. F., & Norenzayan, A. (2007). God is watching you: Priming God concepts increases prosocial behavior in an anonymous economic game. Psychological Science, 18(9), 803–809. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9280.2007.01983.x
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Items of the Scale
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The official, exact operational item phrasing utilized in the experimental protocols of Casidy, Duhachek, Singh, and Tamaddoni (2021) is proprietary and protected under the copyright of the authors and the American Marketing Association.
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To assist researchers in designing experimental manipulation checks consistent with state cognitive activation paradigms, the structural blueprint and conceptual dimensions of the scale items are delineated below. Researchers requiring the verbatim, official inventory should consult the original publication or contact the authors directly.
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Scale Structure and Dimensional Overview
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- Construct Assessed: Momentary state activation of God, religious faith, and divine concepts.
- Temporal Anchor: Immediate present (e.g., \”At this exact moment\”, \”Right now\”).
- Response Options: 7-point Likert scale (1 = Strongly Disagree to 7 = Strongly Agree).
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Illustrative Conceptual Structure of Items
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- Direct Divine Cognition: Captures whether thoughts of God or a Supreme Being are currently active in the participant’s working memory.
\n Illustrative Draft Prompt: \”At this moment, thoughts about God are active in my mind.\”\n - Faith and Theological Salience: Assesses the momentary presence of broader religious ideas and faith-based principles.
\n Illustrative Draft Prompt: \”Right now, I am thinking about religious beliefs or spiritual values.\”\n - Prominence of Sacred Concepts: Gauges the subjective intensity and prominence of divine concepts within current conscious awareness.
\n Illustrative Draft Prompt: \”Religious or divine matters are currently at the forefront of my thoughts.\”\n
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Response Format Specifications
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Rating Scale Anchor Badges:
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Scoring Note
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Responses to all items are summed and averaged to yield a single continuous index of State God-Salience. High mean scores represent elevated momentary cognitive activation of religious concepts.
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“,n “excerpt”: “An in-depth academic examination of the Thinking About God (State) scale by Casidy, Duhachek, Singh, and Tamaddoni (2021), assessing momentary religious salience, psychometric properties, and theoretical foundations.”,n “slug”: “thinking-about-god-state-scale”,n “categories”: [n “Psychometrics”,n “Social Psychology”,n “Cognitive Psychology”n ],n “tags”: [n “Thinking About God”,n “State Religiosity”,n “Religious Priming”,n “Psychometric Scales”,n “Cognitive Accessibility”,n “Consumer Behavior”n ],n “seo_title”: “Thinking About God (State) Scale: Psychometrics & Validity”,n “seo_description”: “Explore the Thinking About God (State) scale by Casidy et al. (2021). Detailed analysis of construct validity, reliability, factor structure, and scoring.”,n “focus_keyword”: “Thinking About God scale”n}