Translation and Validation of Religious Attitude Scale: Role of Demographic Variables

Abstract

The study aimed to translate the Religious Attitude Scale (RAS; Onay, 2000) into Urdu language and established its construct validity in Pakistani culture. Moreover, the relationship of different demographic variables (i.e., age, income, gender, family system) with religious attitude of parents was also explored. The study comprised of two phases: Phase I of the study constituted translation of the original English version of RAS into Urdu language using forward and back translation method. In phase II, the construct validity of RAS was established through Exploratory Factor Analysis and psychometric properties of RAS were determined. A sample (N = 264) of parents comprising mothers (n = 133) and fathers (n = 131) with age range of 26 to 52 years (M = 34.74, SD = 6.0) participated in the study. Results showed that RAS has two factors namely Positive Religious Attitudes and Negative Religious Attitudes. Psychometric properties of the scale were satisfactory. Findings showed that religious attitudes had positive relationship with age; while, were negatively associated with income. Findings revealed nonsignificant differences across gender of the parents on religious attitudes; whereas, individuals belonging to nuclear families had significantly lower religious attitudes than those from joint family system. Future implications were also discussed.