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The Allport-Ross Religious Orientation Scale (ROS) was initially designed to distinguish between mature and immature religious orientation. In Allport’s early formulation, mature religiosity was characterised by the ability to have critical and complex reflection on religious issues - a master- motive providing direction in life, accompanied by flexibility and responsiveness to new informa- tion. Such a faith would be the individual’s working hypothesis, doubting which might be at least 262 theoretically possible. The mature mind would be able to “act whole-heartedly even without abso-

lute certainty” and be “sure without being cocksure.” 263

In order to empirically assess the maturity of the individual religious orientation, a scale for such assessment was developed by Allport and his students. In the process of developing the measuring instrument, both the terminology and some of the original conceptions about the ways of being reli- gious changed. In Allport’s later formulation, the differentiation between mature and immature types of religiosity had transformed into the bipolar opposition between extrinsic and intrinsic types of religiosity. “The extrinsically motivated individual uses his religion, whereas the intrinsically motivated lives his.” The questionnaire devised for assessing these orientations consisted of 11 264 items measuring extrinsic and nine measuring intrinsic religiosity. Whereas the items assessing ex- trinsic orientation seem to fulfil their function, i.e. orientation where the religiosity has a secondary function serving some other primary motivation, the items assessing the intrinsic dimension have

Cutting and Walsh 2008

261

Batson, Schoenrade and Ventis 1993:160

262

Allport 1950: 72, italics added

263

Allport and Ross 1967: 434

been criticised for not measuring only one type of orientation - unlike the scale claims. Rather, the items could characterise a fundamental type of religiosity instead of the mature one that was origi- nally intended. Besides the vagueness of the intrinsic-scale, there is another significant problem 265 associated with the idea of the extrinsic and intrinsic orientations forming a continuum, where any individual will neatly fit in at some point between the opposite poles. Allport and Ross found out that unlike in the theory, there is little or no correlation between the extrinsic and intrinsic scales: same person could score highly on both, and the extrinsic-intrinsic scale as a whole seems to mea- sure two or more mutually independent dimensions, with little mutual correlation. To fix these 266 shortcomings, Spilka and Allen created another scale measuring a persons approach towards reli- giosity in terms of being either committed or consensual. Several studies during the 1970’s, howev- er, seemed to confirm the similarities between the two systems of measurement. In its final formula- tions, the new scale suffered from the same problem as the earlier Allport-Ross scale: The commit- ted-scale seemed most of all to measure an intense devotion to orthodox religious beliefs. 267 To address the issue, Daniel Batson and colleagues introduced a third orientation type. There were aspects originally included in Allport’s formulation of mature religiosity that were left out in the process of creating the questionnaires. Batson felt that these aspects indicated a third orientation type independent of the intrinsic and extrinsic orientations: that of religious Quest. Batson distin- guished three distinct properties characteristic to Quest: 1) Readiness to face existential questions without reducing their complexity; 2) self-criticism and perception of religious doubts as positive and 3) openness to change. In Batson’s own formulation, the Quest orientation scale is meant to measure “an open-ended, active approach to existential questions that resist clearcut, pat

answers.” The early version of the Quest scale turned out to be unreliable an efforts of improving 268 it were made over the years. Nevertheless, doubts about the Quest’s validity have persisted, and de- spite Batson’s addressing the issue, continues to be debated. A critique concerning the heterogenity and multidimensionality of the Quest scale has been raised, and it seems that different types of 269 Quest-orientations can be discerned. 270

Kahoe 1974; Batson, Schoenrade and Ventis 1993:163

265

Batson, Schoenrade and Ventis 1993: 164

266

Batson, Schoenrade, Ventis 1993: 164-166

267

Batson and Schoenrade 1991: 430

268

See Beck, Baker, Robbins, and Dow 2001; Beck and Jessup 2004

269

The “hard” and the “soft” Quests. The former is characterised by frequent changes in religious views, seeing the

270

world religions as equally viable avenues for pursuing truth, being philosophical and existential in orientation and, struggling with existential emotions of isolation and anxiety. The “hard” Quest captures Batson’s descriptions of a “free-roaming existential quest” but may also describe uncertain, conflicted, even confused metaphysical stance, lea- ding a person either toward or away from traditional religious beliefs, and not necessarily having a distinct ending. In contrast to this, the other, “soft” type of Quest includes attributes such as openness, doubt, and growth. What clearly separates this type from the former is that it moves within a limited (but large) territory. The “soft” Quest allows com- mitment to a certain religious worldview yet at the same time incorporate the dynamics inherent in Quest. See Beck- Jessup 2004. This is not all. More sub-dimensions have been proposed. See Edwards and Hall 2011.

Furthermore, even though Quest was originally intended as a third orientation distinct from extrin- sic and intrinsic orientations, there is some indication that some of the sub-types of Quest correlate with the extrinsic orientation, and at least one with the intrinsic orientation. Thus the multidimen- sionality of Quest and the ambivalence of some of the items in terms of what they are indicating are clear problems that the Quest scale if facing. 271