UAB Researchers Develops Expanded Scale Assesses Role Of Higher Power In Health

For years, researchers have wondered if spiritual beliefs are predictive of health-related behavior and knowledge. UAB (University of Alabama at Birmingham) researcher Cheryl L. Holt, Ph.D., assistant professor of preventive medicine, along with researchers from St. Louis University and Florida A&M University, recently developed and tested an expanded scale that provides a more in-depth assessment than previous models. Their study was published in a recent edition of the Journal of Health Psychology.

August 8, 2007

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – For years, researchers have wondered if spiritual beliefs are predictive of health-related behavior and knowledge. UAB (University of Alabama at Birmingham) researcher Cheryl L. Holt, Ph.D., assistant professor of preventive medicine, along with researchers from St. Louis University and Florida A&M University, recently developed and tested an expanded scale that provides a more in-depth assessment than previous models. Their study was published in a recent edition of the Journal of Health Psychology.

“We sought to develop an improved, multidimensional scale to measure the perceived role of a higher power (e.g. God) in one’s health, which we call the spiritual locus of control, and to assess the reliability and validity of the revised scale in a sample of African American women,” Holt said. “We started with a simpler scale that provided limited assessment. But, when we expanded that scale, we found that the spiritual beliefs were more complex. Our findings with the revised instrument were more consistent with theory and our expectations.”

Spirituality based approaches to health promotion in the church are becoming increasingly popular in the African American community. This expanded scale, which provided a more in-depth assessment than previous models about beliefs regarding the role of God in one’s health, could be useful in the development and evaluation of churched-based health communication intervention. It can also be used to tailor specific health communication plans based on an individual’s spiritual and health beliefs.

The researchers administered questionnaires to 108 female African American church-goers and assessed their spiritual health locus of control beliefs and their knowledge of breast cancer and mammography utilization. The expanded scale assessed four dimensions of spiritual health locus of control beliefs:

  • Spiritual Life and Faith: The belief that God will keep one healthy if he or she leads a spiritual life
  • Active Spiritual: The belief that health is a partnership between God and the individual (i.e. ‘Even though I trust God to take care of me, I still need to do my part to take care of myself.’)
  • God’s Grace: The belief that prayer is among the most important things one can do to stay healthy
  • Passive Spiritual: The belief that there is no point in taking care of oneself because it is all up to God anyway

 

The researchers found evidence that Passive Spiritual health locus of control beliefs were significantly associated with having lower levels of knowledge about breast cancer and mammograms, and the women who held these beliefs were less likely to ever have had a mammogram. Spiritual Life and Faith beliefs also were associated with less knowledge about mammograms. Other associations were not significant. Still, the results suggest that the instrument these researchers developed, specifically the four dimensions of spiritual health locus of control beliefs, is a reliable and valid way to evaluate African American women’s spiritual health locus of control beliefs.