Abstract
The concept of spiritual-religious coping gained attention in Brazil with the adaptation and validation of the RCOPE Scale (Panzini 2004; long version: 87 items and brief version: 49 items). The Brief RCOPE still contains a large number of items, so attempts to further reduce the size of the measure are relevant. This study presents the validation process of the Brief SRCOPE scale (14 items) for use in the Brazilian context. Data were collected from the general population (N = 525) and subjected to exploratory factor analysis (EFA; n = 249) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA; n = 276). The EFA resulted in a two-factor solution: Positive Religious Coping (PRC) and Negative Religious Coping (NRC). All 14 items of the original scale were retained and correlated with the same factor as the original scale (KMO = 0.852; 58.15% of total variance explained; PRC Cronbach’s alpha = 0.884 and NRC Cronbach’s alpha = 0.845). The model tested through CFA showed adequate adjustment indices (χ2 = 146.809, DF = 70, χ2/DF = 2.097, NFI = 0.93, CFI = 0.962, GFI = 0.930, AGFI = 0.895, RMSEA = 0.063, PCLOSE = 0.065 and SRMR = 0.0735). The Brief SRCOPE Scale-14 has shown reliability for the studied sample and might be applicable to other contexts. It may ultimately prove useful to professionals and researchers interested in better knowing how people make use of religious coping to face stress and suffering.
Highlights
The concept of religious coping was introduced by Pargament (1997), as an expansion of the coping theory of Lazarus and Folkman (1984). Cummings and Pargament (2010, p. 30) state that “religious coping occurs when a stressor related to a sacred goal arises or when people call upon a coping method they view as sacred in response to a stressor”
The Brief RCOPE Scale is a 14-item measure of religious coping with stress created by Pargament et al (2011), and it is divided into two subscales, each consisting of seven items, which identify clusters of positive and negative religious coping methods (Table 1)
Pargament et al (2011) reviewed several studies that had utilized the SRCOPE scale and the majority suggested that there is an orthogonal relationship between the Positive Religious Coping (PRC) and Negative Religious Coping (NRC) scales
Summary
The concept of religious coping was introduced by Pargament (1997), as an expansion of the coping theory of Lazarus and Folkman (1984). Cummings and Pargament (2010, p. 30) state that “religious coping occurs when a stressor related to a sacred goal arises or when people call upon a coping method they view as sacred in response to a stressor”. The literature has demonstrated significant links between religious coping and a variety of criteria of mental health (Cummings and Pargament 2010; Pargament et al 2013). A large number of researchers have developed numerous studies of religious coping. Research on this subject remains sparse outside the United States and Europe. In Brazil, studies relating spiritual/religious coping began in 2004, with the validation of Pargament’s SRCOPE Scale by Panzini (2004). Her efforts resulted in a long Scale, with 87 items, and a brief Scale, with 49 items. Brazilian studies about religious coping are still in an early stage. Since 2011, there has been a Religions 2018, 9, 31; doi:10.3390/rel9010031 www.mdpi.com/journal/religions
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