Religious beliefs play an important role in the study of religious practices and behaviour. Wulff (1997) suggested that there are four basic attitudes towards religion: Literal Affirmation, Literal Disaffirmation, Reductive Interpretation and Restorative Interpretation. Building on this work, Duriez, Soenans and Hutsebaut (2005) constructed the Post-Critical Belief Scale (PCBS). In their work, ...

This study examined beliefs about the causes and determinants of health, illness, and recovery in an opportunistic sample from Malaysia. In all, 371 women and 350 men completed the Health and Illness Scale, a 124-item scale that examined beliefs about current and future health, and beliefs about the causes of illness and recovery. Each of the four subscales of the Health Illness Scale were fact...

There abound antagonisms in the health care practice and the religious beliefs of people from different societies. When health care practices cross the line of their beliefs, the people will rise to the occasion and oppose the practices. Religion and science are two opposing doctrines. What scientists believe sometimes collide with what different religious contexts uphold. An example where ther...

The present study briefly describes and critiques the kinds of variables used to measure religion in research on mental health and analyzes data from the Handbook of Religion and Health to assess what variables are most commonly used to do so. The analysis found that organizational religion and subjective religiosity were the most widely used measures in research on psychological well-being, de...

The purpose of this study is to investigate religious features of curanderismo, specifically the role of ostensibly Roman Catholic beliefs and practices in the training and work of curandero/as. The integration of religious beliefs and practices within the rituals of curanderismo and how this potential clash of worldviews negatively and positively impacts clients and practitioners are examined....