THINKING STYLES OF CLERGYMEN AND RELIGIOUS COPING

Abstract

The relationship between the religious coping styles of the clergymen in Turkey and lokal and global thinking styles was analyzed in this study in terms of demographic variables and work experience. A personal information form (age, gender, education, work experience) and scales that measured their religious coping and lokal and global thinking styles were applied on 164 clergymen. It was found out that participants used positive religious coping more than the negative one. Moreover, although lokal and global thinking styles distributed closely with each other, global thinking style was prefereed more than the other. At the end of the analysis, it was seen that religious transformation, a subdimension of positive religious coping, had relationship with lokal thinking style. It was also found out that work experience and education level predicted both positive religious coping along with its two subdimensions (turning to God and benevolent religious appraisal) and negative religious coping with its sub-dimension spiritual dissatisfaction. However, surprisingly, education predicted the spiritual dissatisfaction in a negative way. It was established that lokal thinking style and seeking religious direction predicted religious transformation and that lifethreatening events religious pleading predicted seeking religious direction. Furthermore, the variable of age showed any difference in neither thinking styles nor religious coping styles. Another finding of the study is that seeking direction increases in life-threatening events. As a result, one of the goals of religious coping is religious transformation, and lokal thinking style predicts religious transformation. Work experience is an important variable among clergymen. It might be beneficial to organize spiritual care programs aimed at the clergymen by the Presidency of Religious Affaris due to the relationship between spiritual dissatisfaction and work experience. Moreover, it might be helpful for the institutions that give higher education to give pratcical training It is relevant to single out religious services from other service sectors in terms of the increase in the need for spirituality in the lives of the individual and the society and the increase in that need (Park, 2012). As a matter of fact, it can be said that the need for religious services to be professional is increasing (Carroll, 2006). While Muslim clergy in Turkey is working to answer the increasing need for religious services, they are also trying to get professional. The aims of this study are to contribute to limited number of clergy studies in Turkey with its professionalization process and to determine the religious coping styles of clergy, the profession that makes use of religious coping most, but also the one that is affected by the results of negative religious coping most (Pargament, 2001). In addition to those, one of the aims of this research is to study the relationship between religious coping and thinking styles since thinking style is decisive on coping styles (F. Hassan, 2014). Thinking Styles Thinking style is defined as the way that an individual prefers in their thinking and application skills (Sternberg, 2009). Sternberg’s theory of mental self-management consists of five dimensions and thirteen thinking styles within these dimensions (Sternberg, 2009). In situations where an individual’s profile of thinking style, external expectations and individual self-sufficiency conform with each other, the level of success and satisfaction is high (Sternberg, 2009). Theory of mental selfmanagement was designed as five dimensions and thirteen thinking styles within these dimensions. Only local and global thinking styles were preferred in this study since they give information about thinking styles. Local thinking is a thinking style that aims to divide a problem into pieces and finding out what the real solution is by producing solutions from these pieces (Markman, Dyczewski, 2010).Global thinking, however, aims to look at the picture holistically without getting lost in the details and includes all the network of relationships in the whole. It is a thinking style that aims to consider the problem primarily as a whole and to solve it by looking at the whole (Hammouri, 2003; Sternberg, 2009). Religious Coping Coping is the complement of ideas and acts that people use in order to manage their outside conditions with the aid of inner desires in troublesome and stressful circumstances (Park &Folkman, 1997).Religious coping is making use of a religious faith, behaviors and values in stressful situations so as to solve the problem, find a meaning and transform the meaning (Pargament, 1997).The two positive and negative basic forms of religious coping are among the most consistent findings of religious coping literature.Thus, in the process of coping, it is how the individual assesses the situation that determines the coping style rather than what he/she experiences. Hence, the coping style cannot be considered separately (F. Hassan, 2014). However, no research has been found conducted on the relationship between religious coping and thinking styles. Thus, the relationships of those variables that have not been covered in previous studies together were analyzed in this study. Method Two scales along with a personal data form (gender, age, education and work experience were used as a data collection tool. More information about scales is given below. Thinking Styles Inventory (TSI) Thinking Styles Inventory (TSI) was developed by Sternberg and Wagner (1992) based on Stenberg (1988)’s “mental self-management theory”.Fer (2005) adapted unrevised version of TSI to Turkish and studied the validity and reliability of the scale. The Cronbach’s alpha internal consistency coefficient of the scale was found to be 0.89. The scale is a 7-point one that consists of 5 dimensions that measure different thinking styles and 13 sub-dimensions. The scale consists of 104 items, 8 for

Özet

Bu araştırmada, Türkiye'deki din görevlilerinde dini başa çıkma tarzları ile lokal ve global düşünme stilleri arasındaki ilişki demografik değişkenler ve mesleki deneyim bağlamında incelenmiştir. 164 din görevlisine kişisel bilgi formu (yaş,cinsiyet, eğitim,mesleki deneyim), dini başa çıkma ile lokal ve global düşünme stillerini ölçen ölçekler uygulanmıştır. Katılımcıların olumlu dini başa çıkmayı olumsuz dini başa çımadan daha fazla kullandıkları global ve lokal düşünme stillerinin birbirine yakın dağılım göstermekle birlikte global düşünme stilinin daha fazla tercih edildiği tespit edilmiştir. Olumlu dini başa çıkmanın alt boyutu olan dini dönüşüm lokal düşünme stili ile ilişkili çıkmıştır. Mesleki deneyim ve eğitim düzeyinin hem olumlu dini başa çıkmayı diğer iki alt boyutu ile beraber (Allah'a yönelme ve hayra yorma) hem de olumsuz dini başa çıkmanın alt boyutu olan manevi hoşnutsuzluğu yordadığı tesbit edilmiştir. Ancak ilginç bir şekilde eğitim, manevi hoşnutsuzluğu negatif yönde yordamıştır. Dini dönüşümü, lokal düşünme stili ve dini istikamet arayışı; dini istikamet arayışını yaşamı tehdit eden durumların yaşanması ve dini yalvarmanın yordadığı görülmüştür. Ayrıca, cinsiyet değişkeni ne düşünme stilinde ne de dini başa çıkma tarzında farklılık göstermemiştir. Çalışmanın bir diğer bulgusu ise yaşamı tehdit eden durumlarda istikamet arayışı artmaktadır. Sonuç olarak dini baş etmenin hedeflerinden birisi dini dönüşümüdür ve lokal düşünme tarzı dini dönüşümü yordamaktadır. Din görevlilerinde mesleki deneyim önemli bir değişkendir. Manevi hoşnutsuzluk ile mesleki deneyim arasında ilişki nedeniyle Diyanet İşleri Başkanlığı'nın çalışanlarına yönelik manevi bakım programları hazırlamaları faydalı olabilir. Ayrıca yüksek din eğitimi veren kurumların uygulamaya yönelik çalışmalar yapmaları faydalı olabilir