"Discourses on the Method to guide one's Mind correctly and find Truth in the Sciences" was the title of one of Descartes ' key treatises - one of the basic texts that laid the foundation of modern science. Our "Methods" section will focus on how to "study religion". These methods may differ in different disciplines, although the epistemological principles formulated by Descartes seem to be the same. We will leave out for the moment the question of whether the very foundation of "scientific methods" is unshakeable; but in any case, it should be recognized that these methods are subject to change.

This can be seen in the example of methods of studying religiosity, which is devoted to the first article in this new video. The word "religiosity" (religiosite) was born in the depths of sociology in the middle of the XX century and has now become a common concept, adjacent and accompanying the term "religion". Elena Prutskova traces the evolution of the concept itself and the history of methods for measuring religiosity in quantitative research.

We hope to continue this column with similar publications that would focus on methods of studying religion. Methodological reflection in the science of religion in Russian is, alas, infrequent, and therefore arguments about the method on the pages of our magazine are welcome in every possible way: will they not help "to guide our mind correctly"?

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Introduction

The article discusses the ways of operationalization of the concept of "religiosity" used in quantitative empirical studies. We reconstruct the main stages of the development of quantitative approaches to the study of religiosity, where the problem of operationalization of this concept was particularly acute, and then, using the example of four modern international comparative studies, we consider in more detail how this affected the methods of operationalization of the concept of "religiosity"used in practice.

In addition to international comparative studies, which we focus on, there are a large number of domestic studies carried out within the framework of the sociology of religion both in Russia (where, for example, along with the concept of religiosity, the concept of church membership is important) and abroad, which we will not discuss in detail in this article. Quantitative studies of religion use various theories and ideas about the role of religion. Some of them use the methods of operationalization described in the article, some use operationalization at a different, non-individual level (for example, a parish, congregation, or country), and others are extremely difficult to operationalize, showing up only in indirect indicators.

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We limit ourselves to considering religiosity at the individual level.

The problem in this case is that religiosity is a latent (not directly measurable) characteristic, which entails the need to select adequate indicators in which it manifests itself. Within the framework of the quantitative approach, religiosity is a variable measured on a specific scale (or using several scales). The scales discussed in this article were most often tested in surveys of Protestants or outside the confessional (such as indicators used in large international studies). Here lies one of the main problems of measuring religiosity and creating unified indicators, which is that some manifestations of religiosity, such as attending services, praying, receiving communion, reading the Bible, etc., work well for Christianity, and for measuring the religiosity of representatives of some other faiths may not be related to religion at all. In international studies, when a sociologist deals with many different faiths, it is necessary to use the most unified indicators that make sense in the context of most faiths, which is why their informative value is largely lost. This problem has not yet been successfully solved and, apparently, cannot be fully solved in the framework of quantitative studies of religion (since the questions asked for different faiths in many cases must be asked differently and about different things, which makes it impossible to compare them), although attempts are being made to solve it, at least partially (For example, questions are asked not only about the Bible, but also about the Koran, etc.). One of the most universal questions that makes sense for most religions is the question of how important religion is in the respondent's life.

In addition, we can highlight another problem of operationalization and measurement of religiosity in quantitative research. It consists in the fact that the unit of observation in quantitative studies of religion is usually individuals, which excludes the presence in such studies of religiosity that exists at other levels (for example, a religious community).

A limitation of this kind of research is also the fact that, even if you select the ideal ones from the point of view of theory

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indicators for the concept we are interested in, we face the problem of their direct measurement and are forced to base only on the respondent's declared beliefs, behavior, knowledge, etc., which, for various reasons, may be far from the real state of affairs (while the respondent himself may not be aware of this).

Despite these problems, there is a fairly strong and scientifically sound tradition of quantitative study of individual religiosity, which we will try to restore at least partially in this article.

It should be noted that in sociology, this topic of research appears very early, in particular, in the works of the classics of sociology - E. Durkheim, M. Weber, etc., but the concept of religiosity begins to be actively developed only in the middle of the XX century.

Multidimensional approach to the concept of "religiosity"

The basis for the idea of how to study religion in quantitative empirical sociological research was laid in the 60s and 70s of the XX century. The main idea discussed during this period was that religion is a multidimensional concept. On the pages of magazines, books, and conferences, the question of how many dimensions (axes)are actively discussed at this time it is necessary to distinguish within the concept of religion in order to adequately evaluate it in empirical studies. Apparently, this was also due to the rapid development and popularization of multidimensional data analysis methods, in particular, factor and cluster analysis, as well as the development of computer technologies that made it possible to quickly perform these calculations in practice.

This kind of research was mainly carried out at the junction of two disciplines - psychology and sociology. Let us consider the main stages of the development of a multidimensional approach to the study of religion.

Theoretical foundations - five dimensions of religiosity. Glock

Operationalization of the concept of religiosity in the framework of a multidimensional approach was usually based on the fact that there are certain religions that set a set of requirements for a person,

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which you need to conform to: have certain beliefs, know certain texts, practice certain practices, etc.

One of the main authors cited as the founders of a multidimensional approach to the study of religiosity is C. Glock. In a 1962 paper1, he identifies the following five dimensions, which, in his opinion, make it possible to describe religion in its entirety::

1) experiential 2 (experiential) dimension: subjective emotional religious experience reflecting personal religiosity;

2) ritualistic: participation in religious practices, activities, and rituals, such as attending religious services;

3) ideological: acceptance of some belief system;

4) intellectual: knowledge about faith, awareness;

5) consequential measurement: consequences, outcomes, and the impact of the previous four manifestations of religion on values and behavior outside the religious context.

Although the issues of measuring religiosity have also been considered by other authors, it is this article by Ch. Glocka served as a catalyst for the development of an active discussion, which lasted for several decades, regarding a set of indicators that make it possible to measure individual religiosity as fully as possible.

There is also an earlier work by Ch. Glock's "Religious Revival in America" 3, in which he presented religiosity as a four-dimensional concept (here the intellectual dimension was not yet highlighted).

The measurement of consequences as part of the main dimensions of religiosity has attracted considerable criticism, and has not been commonly used in operational definitions since.

1. Glock Ch.Y. On the Study of Religious Commitment //Religious Education, Research Supplement. 1962. Vol. 42.

2. Although the name contains the word "experience", the main meaning is that it is an emotional experience associated with feelings.

3. Glock Ch. Y. The Religious Revival in America // Zahl J. Religion in the Face of America. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1959.

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religion, acting as a dependent variable (i.e., a characteristic that is influenced by religiosity).

In addition to the actual set of indicators that need to be measured in order to determine religiosity in its entirety, an important question is the relationship of these indicators - whether they should be significantly related to each other or whether they can be independent, that is, high religiosity in one of them (for example, knowledge) may not necessarily entail high religiosity. C. Glock considered that it is theoretically possible that some of these dimensions of religiosity are largely independent, but "it is unlikely that the various manifestations of religiosity are completely independent of each other"4.

At present, this issue is of key importance, which, for example, was reflected in the program statement of M. Chavez regarding the extremely widespread problem in religious studies of the erroneous idea of the consistency of the phenomenon of religiosity (religious congruence fallacy)5, which has three meanings: first, the erroneous idea that the religious beliefs and values of an individual are the same as those of They represent a logical, consistent system, secondly, that people's behavior directly follows from these beliefs and values, and thirdly, that these beliefs and values are stable over time and do not depend on the situation, the context in which they manifest themselves. 6 The other pole is the position of R. Inglehart and P. Norris on this issue. question: they are faced with the task of somehow solving the problem of comparability of indicators of religiosity in comparative cross-cultural studies, and they come to the conclusion that the main question about religion, on the basis of which it is possible to compare representatives of different cultures and faiths, is the question of the importance of religion. On the one hand, it is a mac-

4. Glock Ch.Y. On the Study of Religious Commitment //Religious Education, Research Supplement. 1962. Vol. 42. P. 99 - 100.

5. Although some examples given by M. Some of these factors may be challenged and attributed not to a lack of coherence, but, for example, to the influence of a third factor mediating the relationship between religiosity and its consequences, yet the problem itself persists.

6. Chaves M. Rain Dances in the Dry Season: Overcoming the Religious Congruence Fallacy//Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. 2010. Vol. 49. No. 1. P. 2.

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On the one hand, it is formally unified, independent of the content of beliefs for different faiths, and on the other hand, it correlates well (at the country level) with other indicators of religiosity. In addition to the importance of religion (or God), it is possible to refer to religious practices, but since the answers to these questions at the macro level are largely related, in many cases the question of the importance of religion (or God)is sufficient .7
The problem arises when the very inconsistency between different dimensions of religiosity turns out to be an important characteristic that determines the form of dependence between religiosity and other indicators, for example, basic values or behavior outside of a religious context.

First attempts at empirical analysis of religiosity as a multidimensional concept

In the early 60s, several empirically oriented works appeared in which religiosity is considered as a multidimensional concept. We will consider one of the articles of this kind, although other authors worked in the same direction 8.

Based on the ideas expressed by Ch. In his article "Basic Dimensions of Church Membership" in 1961, E. Fukuyama proposed his own components of religiosity as a multidimensional phenomenon: "Religion is a phenomenon that can be described in terms of at least four main dimensions: cognitive, cultic,and religious. beliefs (creedal) and piety( devotional); these dimensions represent the distinctive types (styles) of religious orientation"9. Apparently, the specified article is E. Fukuyama is one of the earliest examples of empirical analysis of religiosity as a multidimensional phenomenon. The work is based on the analysis of data from 4,095 questionnaires completed by members of twelve Congregational Christian churches in the United States (the year of the study and the name of the study are not specified in the article).

7. Inglehart R., Norris P. Sacred and Secular. Religion and Politics Worldwide. Cambridge University Press, 2004. P. 219 - 225.

8. For example, G. Lenski: Lenski G. The Religious Factor. New York: Doubleday & Co., 1961.

9. Fukuyama Y. The Major Dimensions of Church Membership//Review of Religious Research [Effective City Church Study]. 1961. Vol. 2. No. 4. P. 155.

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The cognitive dimension (knowledge about religion) is the main complement to E. Fukuyama's approach to the system proposed by Ch. Glock in 1959, which the latter then (in a 1962 article) adopted and called the "intellectual dimension". Cult dimension E. Fukuyama corresponds to the ritualistic Glock dimension, beliefs are the equivalent of the ideological Glock dimension, and piety is the analog of the" experiential " dimension.

E. Fukuyama rejects the measurement of "consequences" as part of religiosity: "This conceptualization of religious orientation does not include what Glock calls the measurement of" consequences, " what people do as a result of their religious beliefs, feelings, and practices. This does not mean that the consequences of religion are irrelevant, but rather that they are not part of the main components of religiosity in themselves."10
Constructing scales of religiosity as a multidimensional concept

We will look at two key works that laid the foundation for empirical analysis and evaluation of religiosity as a multidimensional concept, published in the second half of the 60s and served as the main reference point for scientists who worked in this direction later.

A breakthrough in the field of empirical analysis of religiosity as a multidimensional phenomenon was the article "Religiosity in Five Dimensions: an Empirical Analysis"published in 1966 by Joseph Faulkner and Gordon de Jong11. Based on the theoretical constructions of C. Glock (the authors refer to the 1962 article, see above), J. Faulkner and G. de Jong construct scales for each proposed measurement using the Guttmann scale analysis 12.

10. Fukuyama Y. The Major Dimensions of Church Membership. P. 156.

11. Faulkner J.E., de Jong G.F. Religiosity in 5-D: An Empirical Analysis//Social Forces. 1966. Vol. 45. No. 2.

12. This method of constructing scales belongs to the test tradition of measurement in sociology and is based on the idea that if there is a latent variable that determines the answers to some ordered set of dichotomous questions, its value can be used to restore the answers to all the original questions with a minimum number of errors. A detailed description of this method can be found in the book: Guttman L. Main components of scale analysis// Mathematical Methods in modern bourgeois Sociology, Moscow: Progress Publ., 1966.

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The scales were tested by the authors on 362 students of a course in sociology at Penn State University in 1964. As a result, each of the scales included from 4 to 5 statements. Listing all the indicators would take up too much space, so as an example, we will limit ourselves to listing the questions that form the basis of the "ideological" scale (the other four scales are constructed in the same way)13:

1. The end of the world:

Do you believe that the world will end in accordance with God's will?

* * Yes, I believe that.

* I'm not sure about that.

* No, I don't believe that.

2. The idea of God:

* Which of the following statements most accurately reflects your idea of God?

* * I believe in the Supreme God, the creator of the universe, who knows all my inner thoughts and feelings and to whom, one day, I will have to answer.

* I believe in a Power greater than myself, which some people call God, and some people call Nature.

* I believe in the value of man, not in God or a Higher Being.

* The so-called secrets of the universe are completely knowable by scientific methods based on natural laws.

* I do not know exactly what I believe.

* I am an atheist.

3. The need for repentance:

Do you believe that a person must repent before God can forgive their sins?

* * Yes, God's forgiveness can only come after repentance.

* No, God does not require repentance.

* I don't need repentance.

4. God and History:

* Which of the following statements best reflects your understanding of God's involvement in history?

* * God has worked and continues to work in the history of mankind.

13. Faulkner J.E., de Jong G.F. Religiosity in 5-D: An Empirical Analysis//Social Forces. 1966. Vol. 45. No. 2. P. 252 - 253.

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* God has acted in the past, but is not acting at the present time.

* God has no part in human history.

5. View of the Bible:

Which of the following statements best captures your understanding of the Bible?

* * The Bible is the Word of God, and everything it says is true.

* * The Bible is a God-inspired word, but written by a human being; its basic morals and religious teaching are true, but because it was written by a human being, it may contain some human errors.

* The Bible is a valuable book because it was written by wise and good people, but God had nothing to do with it.

* The Bible was written by people who lived a very long time ago, so for today it is practically of no value.

The answers to the questions were given in a dichotomous form (corresponds/does not correspond to the religious tradition). If the options marked with an asterisk were selected, it was assumed that the respondent's belief system corresponds to "traditional". J. Faulkner and G. de Jong justify the use of the "traditional-non-traditional" continuum as follows: "The problem that arises when developing measures of religiosity, first of all, is drawing a line between what is considered more religious and less religious. ... It is necessary to select a hidden continuum along which individual responses can be arranged. ... The advantage of measuring religiosity on the traditional-nontraditional continuum is that the Catholic, Jewish, and major branches of the Protestant faiths have very similar views on the most common religious issues. This, of course, does not apply to questions of a more private level. " 14
J. Faulkner and G. de Jong also analyze the relationship between the five obtained scales using correlation coefficients. As a result of the analysis, the authors conclude that all the obtained scales have a significant linear relationship with each other (the correlation coefficients of each scale with each scale vary from 0.36 to 0.58), the ideological scale has the highest relationship with other scales, and the consequence scale is the most independent.

14. Faulkner J. E., de Jong G. F. Religiosity in 5-D: An Empirical Analysis. P. 247.

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In 1968, a book by C. Glock and R. Stark 15 was published, which develops a method for empirical assessment of religiosity in five dimensions proposed earlier by Ch. A glock. The authors construct seven indexes to assess the four dimensions of religiosity and abandon the fifth-the "consequence scale". The fifth dimension is inherently different from the first four, and the authors omit it because "it is not fully clear to what extent religious consequences are part of religious commitment or simply follow from it."16One of the interesting results of this study was the conclusion that the four dimensions of religiosity are relatively independent, although there were almost no correlations. 17 same as the results obtained by J. R. R. Tolkien. Faulkner and G. de Jong (the maximum values of the correlation coefficients between the measurements varied depending on the denomination in the range of 0.5-0.57* on average, they were 0.2-0.27). It was important for the authors to show that, despite the presence of statistically significant relationships, it is impossible to predict the values of all other indicators with sufficient accuracy from one of the dimensions, and that all the dimensions of religiosity they entered a priori are important: "... the level of independence between the dimensions of religious involvement is more than sufficient confirmation of our initial analytical differences. Of course, it was never intended that they would not be linked, but only that they could largely change independently, which they actually do. Thus, empirical evidence leads us to view dimensions of religious engagement as related but distinct manifestations of piety. 18

In addition to the main dimensions of religiosity, Ch. Glock and R. Stark consider two additional indicators of community engagement: congregational friendships and participation in religious organizations

15. Glock Ch. Y, Stark R. American Piety: The Nature of Religious Commitment. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1968.

16. Ibid. P. 16.

17. In addition to correlation coefficients, the authors also refer to unpublished results of factor analysis, which showed the initially assumed structure-in this case, already orthogonal, i.e. completely independent-dimensions of religiosity.

18. Ibid. P. 181.

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(communal involvement). Here, Glock and Stark appeal to the ideals of church building following the example of the first Christian communities, speaking in sociological terms-as a "primary group", but do not include these indicators in the concept of religiosity, since "it has long been recognized that these ideals are often, and perhaps in most cases (typically), not implemented in practice neither at the level of churches, nor at the level of church members. " 19
Discussion on the number of dimensions of religiosity

Since the late 60s, and especially actively-in the early 70s, on the pages of journals and conferences, psychologists and sociologists dealing with the topic of religiosity have been discussing how many dimensions are necessary for an adequate analysis of this concept. At the same time, the work is carried out simultaneously in two directions: first, reducing the number of dimensions, up to the statement that religiosity is a one-dimensional phenomenon, and secondly, the search for new, additional dimensions of religiosity.

In 1969, J. R. R. Tolkien wrote: Fichter publishes the article "The Sociological Measurement of religiosity", where he identifies several problems that are associated with the construction of tools measuring religiosity, in particular, the impossibility of creating a universal measuring tool for different faiths, as well as the impossibility of finding parameters that do not change over time.20
J. Fichter criticizes the scale of consequences proposed by C. Glock, not only because it is difficult to operationalize, but also because it is "logically redundant": "Regardless of whether the consequential dimension is difficult or easy to operationalize, it is logically redundant. Everything measured in the category of religious behavior is a manifestation, expression, or consequence of religiosity. ... A Christian's faith, attitude, and behavior can be expressed and measured because they are a consequence of being a Christian. " 21
19. Clock Ch. Y., Stark R. Op.cit. P. 164.

20. Fichter J.H. Sociological Measurement of Religiosity//Review of Religious Research. 1969. Vol. 10. No. 3. P. 171.

21. Ibid. P. 172.

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Also by J. R. R. Tolkien. Fichter emphasizes the need to include a social component in the concept of religiosity - "community" (communion): "The dimension of social community (communion) ... means that the religious people we study are in some sense members of a religious group, denomination or church. ... One measure of religious behavior must necessarily reflect the degree of church involvement in terms of social relations with people belonging to the same religious group. " 22
There are two ways to include the social component as an indicator of religiosity at the individual level, which are currently used in practice in quantitative empirical studies. Firstly, it is a consideration of participation in the affairs of the religious community on an equal basis with participation in the activities of other voluntary organizations, and secondly, it is a consideration in terms of involvement in social networks in the parish or within the congregation. So, for example, R. Putnam and Ch. Lim shows, using the results of the General Social Survey in the United States, that the level of subjective well-being depends on the frequency of attending religious services, since the latter indicator significantly increases the number of friends in the parish/within the congregation.23
It should be noted that although the social component of individual religiosity has rarely been considered by researchers, there is a noticeable trend in the sociology of religion, aimed at studying various forms of organization of religious life at the level of parishes, congregations, etc. Such research is most developed in the United States, where it is called "congregational research." 24
The discussion about the basic dimensions of religiosity in the 60s and 70s developed in several directions. Some researchers have tried to reduce the number of dimensions that need to be taken into account in order to create a fairly good indicator of religiosity. To do this, they are provided with-

22. Ibid. P. 173.

23. Lim Ch., Putnam R. Religion, Social Networks, and Life Satisfaction//American Sociological Review.2010. Vol. 75. No. 6.

24. See, for example: Chaves M. Congregations in America. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2004.

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statistical procedures were changed, in particular, the correlation coefficients between the scales, for example, J. Gibbs and K. Kreider 25, or factor analysis that allows you to select a smaller number of axes, for example, R. Clayton and J. Gladen 26. Many works of this kind are based on the logic of constructing scales of religiosity proposed by J. Faulkner and G. de Jong, and also refer to the work of Ch. Glock and R. Stark 1968 and the measurement of religiosity Ch. A glock. So, for example, sociologists R. Clayton and J. Gladen, analyzing the results of two studies using factor analysis (student questionnaires, five scales of hours). Glock, 23 initial questions) conclude that religiosity is one-dimensional, since the ideological dimension accounts for about 8% of the variance 27.

Other authors, on the contrary, use the same procedures to introduce new dimensions of religiosity. For example, M. King, using cluster and factor analysis, comes to the conclusion that there are nine (1967) and more (in subsequent articles) dimensions of the "religious variable"28. M. King and R. Hunt

25. In a 1970 paper by J. Gibbs and K. Kreider does not offer any own idea of religiosity, but only states the presence of high correlations between the scales constructed in the logic of J. R. R. Tolkien. Faukner and G. de Jong on a different data set using slightly different initial indicators, to a greater extent, according to the authors, consistent with the constructions of C. Glock and R. Stark. See: Gibbs J. O., Crader K. W. A Criticism of Two Recent Attempts to Scale Glock and Stark's Dimensions of Religion: A Research Note / / Sociological Analysis. 1970. Vol. 31. No. 2.

26. Clayton R.R., Gladden J.W. The Five Dimensions of Religiosity: Toward Demythologizing a Sacred Artifact//Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. 1974. Vol. 13. No. 2.

27. Strictly speaking, the single axis identified by factor analysis is not completely ideological in the sense in which it is distinguished. Glock and R. Stark, since it includes 13-14 questions from the 23 original ones and includes questions from all the original scales, except for the scale of consequences, but the authors find it possible to define the resulting axis as ideological. See: Clayton R. R., Gladden J. W. The Five Dimensions of Religion: Toward Demythologizing a Sacred Artifact / / Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. 1974. Vol. 13. No. 2. P. 137 - 139.

28. First paper published in 1967: King M. B. Measuring the Religious Variable: Nine Proposed Dimensions / / Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. 1967. Vol. 6. No. 2. Then, in the course of several subsequent years, articles are published in collaboration with psychologist R. Hunt, complementing the analysis and developing the ideas expressed in the article of 67: King M. B., Hunt R. A. Measuring the Religious Variable: Amended Findings / / Journal for the Scientific Study 1969. Vol. 8. No. 2; King M. B., Hunt R. A. Measuring the Religious Variable: Replication / / Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. 1972. Vol. 11. No. 3; King M.B., Hunt R. A. Measuring the Religious Variable: National Replication // Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. 1975. Vol. 14. No. 1.

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Instead of testing their scales on students, they conduct an analysis on a nationwide sample of 29 and conclude that the scales are applicable to Protestants in the United States and Canada. As for other faiths and other countries, the authors mention the need for additional verification of the characteristics of the obtained scales.

In general, the logic of this type of work, where an attempt is made to search for scales of religiosity, is approximately the same and consists of a sequence of several steps:

1) selection of a large number (up to several hundred in some studies) of indicators (taken from previous studies or introduced by the author himself) that correspond to a certain set of assumed dimensions of religiosity;

2) conducting a study in which respondents give answers in different formats according to a selected set of indicators (choosing one of the answer options, agreeing/disagreeing, rating on a 5-point scale);

3) if necessary, re - encode respondents ' responses in a dichotomous form (for example, a traditional / non-traditional response);

4) performing factor analysis and / or cluster analysis for all variables;

5) a description of the obtained measurements of religiosity, some of which usually coincide with the results of previous "classical" works, and the other part does not coincide: either the assumed axes are not found, or new axes are found.

"External" and "internal" religious orientation, religion as a "search"

The distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic religious orientation, which is widely used in the psychology of religion, was introduced by G. Allport in the 60s.30 It was originally conceived as two poles of the same scale, but empirical studies have shown that there is a significant correlation between these two scales.

29. In 1975, M. King and R. Hunt analyzed data collected during the Presbyterian Panel (USA, 1973).

30. See, for example: A UportG. W., Ross J. M. Personal Religious Orientation and Prejudice// Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 1967. Vol. 5. No. 4.

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There are no two religious orientations, so they have come to be seen as two independent dimensions, or axes of religiosity. In short, the meaning of internal religious orientation is religion as an end, and external orientation is religion as a means. An externally oriented person uses religion as a means to achieve some non-religious goals, for example: higher status, communication, security, receiving support, etc., while for an internally oriented person, religion is a value in itself, it is the goal of itself, it is the way of existence of this person. The results of empirical studies have shown that these orientations are not mutually exclusive, they can be present (be significantly expressed) or absent (be weakly expressed) at the same time.

Starting from the distinction "religion as end/religion as means", D. Batson - alone in 197631 and together with L. Ventis in 1982 - adds to these two orientations (end and means) a third - religion as search, and shows that it also represents an independent dimension of religiosity. Religion as a search involves considering existential questions in all their complexity: "An individual who approaches religion in this way is aware that he or she does not know, and probably will never know, the ultimate truth in such matters. At the same time, these questions are considered important, and preliminary, tentative answers are sought."32. There are two versions of the scale: the original version, consisting of 6 statements (proposed in 1982), and the later version, an improved version, consisting of 12 statements (proposed in 1991). The statements reflect three aspects that define such a religious orientation.:

1) willingness to raise existential questions without reducing their complexity;

2) self-criticism and treating religious doubts as something positive;

3) openness to change.

31. Batson C. D. Religion as Prosocial: Agent or Double Agent?//Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. 1976. Vol. 15. No. 1.

32. Batson C. D., Schoenrade RA. Measuring Religion as Quest: 1) Validity Concerns// Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. 1991. Vol. 30. No. 4. R 417.

33. Batson C. D., Schoenrade RA. Measuring Religion as Quest: 2) Reliability Concerns// Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. 1991. Vol. 30. No. 4. R 431.

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Studies have shown that this measurement does indeed form an independent scale, but it has been criticized for not being a measurement of religiosity itself.

Although this line of development of the operationalization of the concept of religiosity is a very significant tradition in the psychology of religion, it has practically not influenced the methods of operationalization of religiosity in international comparative quantitative studies of religion, remaining almost entirely within the framework of the psychology of religion.

Current state of methodological equipment for analyzing religiosity in the framework of the psychology of religion: a hierarchical approach

Methodological equipment for analyzing religiosity is currently most fully reflected in the framework of the psychology of religion. One of the main texts referred to by both psychologists and sociologists is the book "Measures of Religiosity", written by psychologists P. Hill and R. Hood.34 The authors collected more than a hundred scales of religiosity in it. After the book was published, new scales appeared, but it has not yet lost its relevance. This book is supplemented by P. Hill's article "Measurement in the Psychology of Religion and Spirituality" in the Handbook of the Psychology of Religion and Spirituality, 35 as well as the chapter "Foundations of the Empirical Psychology of Religion" in the book "Psychology of Religion: An Empirical Approach" .36
P. Hill uses a hierarchical approach to classify measures of religiosity and identifies two levels of measurement of religiosity in modern psychology of religion: the general level ("dispositional religiosity") and particular manifestations ("functional religiosity"). What P. Hill calls dispositional religiosity is an indicator that allows you to answer the question of how religious a person is

34. Hill P. C., Hood R. W.Jr. Measures of Religiosity. Birmingham, Alabama: Religious Education Press, 1999.

35. Hill P. C. Measurement in the Psychology of Religion and Spirituality//Handbook of the Psychology of Religion and Spirituality/Eds.: Paloutzian R. F., Park C. L. New York, London: Guilford Press, 2005.

36. Hood R. W., Hill P. C., Spilka B. The Psychology of Religion: An Empirical Approach. Fourth Edition. New York, London: The Guilford Press, 2009.

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generally. Such a statement of the question seems justified to the author, in particular, because according to empirical studies, many manifestations of religiosity are largely related (correlated) and form a single phenomenon. For example, with an increase in the frequency of attending church services, it is more likely that other indicators of religiosity will also be high (although, as mentioned above, this is not always the case). Measures of this level allow you to get indicators that reflect "the religious factor as a whole, which allows you to predict the values of many other variables"37. Measures of dispositional religiosity include indicators of general religiosity or spirituality, religious commitment, development, and history. The second level of the hierarchy is functional religiosity: "People show great diversity in how they experience religious (and spiritual) reality, in the motives that determine their religiosity, in the ways in which they use their own religiosity to solve the problems they face. This is a lower functional level ... frequently evaluates sublevelsIt is useful for predicting more specific variables... " 38. Measures of functional religiosity include religious practices, beliefs, values, experiences, etc.

Religiosity in international empirical research

Currently, there are many open sources of data from sociological studies that include the topic of religiosity. Among the largest international research programs are the World Values Survey (WVS)39, the European Values Study (EVS)40, and Europey-

37. Hill E. C. Measurement in the Psychology of Religion and Spirituality//Handbook of the Psychology of Religion and Spirituality/Eds.: Paloutzian R. F., Park C. L. New York, London: Guilford Press, 2005. P. 48.

38. Ibid.

39. Official website: http://www.worldvaluessurvey.org/(accessed 26.06.2010).

40. Official website: http://www.europeanvaluesstudy.eu/(accessed: 31.10.2010).

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ESS (European Social Survey)41, ISSP (International Social Survey Program)42. The operationalization of the concept of "religiosity" is in some cases more detailed, in some cases less detailed, but in most cases two dimensions of religiosity are presented in sufficient detail There are also indicators of general religiosity, including self-identification with a particular religion, an assessment of one's own religiosity, an assessment of the importance of religion, and indicators of the respondent's religious socialization (history). Table 1 shows the indicators of religiosity available in each of these studies.

The International Program for Social Research - Religion is part of a large series of studies devoted to certain aspects of social life. Waves of research on religion were conducted in 1991, 1998, and 2008 (36 countries participated in the last wave). In this study, there is a large set of indicators of religiosity, but not enough attention is paid to the issues of comparing the wording of questions in different languages, which means that it is impossible to cross-country comparison based on some questions, since they are understood differently by respondents in different countries. As an example, we can cite the question of comparing religiosity and "spirituality". The English version reads as follows: "What best describes you? ... I follow a religion and consider myself to be a spiritual person interested in the sacred or the supernatural43". In the Russian questionnaire, this statement was translated as follows: "Which of the following statements applies to you personally to the greatest extent? ... I am a religious person and consider myself a spiritual person who is interested in the sacred and supernatural." In this case, there are two potential sources of disparity: first, in the Russian translation, the meaning of the term "spirituality" in the Russian language is not clear.-

41. Official website: http://www.europeansocialsurvey.org (accessed 26.06.2010).

42. Official website: http://www.issp.org/(accessed 26.06.2010).

43. In the question, you can choose one of four possible answers, for the sake of brevity, we give only the wording of the first one.

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The use of the phrase "spiritual person", which has positive connotations of morality and improvement of the spirit, while in English 44 this word has only the opposition of the material and non-material (spirit and body), as well as religious meaning (for example, "spiritual person"); secondly, in the English version of the word "spiritual person", the meaning of the word "spiritual person" is somewhat obscured. sometimes the phrase "to follow a religion" is used, which means rather than "to consider yourself a religious person", but "to be a follower of some religion", which, as research shows, is not always the same, especially in Russia, where the percentage of those who consider themselves to belong to Orthodoxy is very high, but non-religious.

Against the background of competing programs, the European Social Research Project stands out for its methodological accuracy and transparency, which involves an extensive network of researchers engaged in methodological work. A collection of texts is available on the website of this study, which provide the basis for operationalizing the basic concepts and selecting the questions used in the study 45. The European Social Survey is conducted in 30 countries and consists of two modules: permanent and variable. The permanent module includes a section on religion. Among the studies considered in this article, this is the most "young" study, which made it possible to take into account and not repeat certain shortcomings of other international comparative studies - it has been conducted every two years since 2002, and data from five waves are currently available. The European Social Survey has done a lot of work to compare questionnaires in different languages and bring them to a single standard, but here, compared to other studies, the set of questions about religiosity that are available for analysis is most limited - only indicators of general religiosity and religious practices are present, while religious beliefs are the most common. they are not represented in the questionnaire.

44. See, for example: Bochinger Ch. Spirituality/ / The Brill Dictionary of Religion. Vol. 4: S-Z / Ed. by Kocku von Stuckrad. Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2006. P. 1808 - 1809.

45. Billet J. Proposal for Questions on Religious Identity // European Social Survey Core Questionnaire Development, Chapter 9. 2002 (http://www.europeansocialsurvey.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=62&Ite mid=96, дата обращения: 25.06.2010).

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Table 1. Operationalization of the concept of "religiosity" in the framework of international comparative studies

Indicators

ISSP

EVS

WVS

ESS

General religiosity

Self-identification of a respondent with a particular religion

+

+

+

+

Evaluating your own religiosity

+

+

+

+

Importance the importance of religion

+

+

religions the importance of god

+

+

Religious beliefs of parents

+

socialization religion of the spouse (s)

+

attending religious services by the respondent's parents at 11-12 years of age

+

attending religious services by a respondent aged 11-12 years

+

+

Particular manifestations of religiosity

Religious beliefs in God

+

+

+*

beliefs in life after death

+

+

+*

into the existence of paradise

+

+

+*

into the existence of hell

+

+

+*

into religious miracles

+

in the transmigration of souls (reincarnation)

+

+

to nirvana

+

that deceased ancestors have the ability to influence

+

on the living ones

into the existence of the devil

+

into the existence of angels

+

in the evil eye, damage

+

in amulets/talismans

+

+

in foreseeing the future

+

in spiritual healers

+

the existence of sin

+

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Indicators

ISSP

EVS

WVS

ESS

Religious practices/behavior

prayer

+

+

+

+

attending religious services

+

+

+

+

participation in the activities of a religious community/organization/church

+

+

availability of religious items

+

visiting holy places for religious purposes

+

observing the fast

+

communion with God without the church

+

+

*These questions were present in the 4th wave, but were removed from the 5th wave questionnaire of the WVS study.

The greatest variety of indicators of religiosity is found in the International Program for Social Research, but there are few other variables that are interesting from the point of view of studying the relationship between religiosity and other indicators. The "European Study of Values" does not have this drawback, where the possibility of overlapping with many other variables is added to the detailed operationalization of the concept of "religiosity".

The European Values Survey is an international survey that covers most European countries. As the name suggests, the study is devoted to values, and there is also a fairly detailed section on religion. To date, data from four waves are available: 1981, 1990, 1999, and 2008 (the last wave involved 46 countries). Russia has been participating since the second wave. This is one of the first comparative studies that allows, on the one hand, to use significant time intervals in the analysis and record changes taking place in countries, but on the other hand, this is associated with certain methodological problems. For example, the wording of some questions becomes outdated over time, but in order to ensure comparability of data, it is necessary to keep them as accurate as possible, which is obviously associated with certain difficulties. "World Values Survey" - related to the previous study, with a broader geographical scope, also devoted to valuable information.-

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There is also a section on religion. Data from five waves from 1981 to 2005 are available (a total of 87 countries are included in the database). There is also a combined array of the European and World Values Survey from 1981 to 2004, as the questionnaire questions largely coincided. This significantly expands the geographical scope and the number of time slices available for analysis. Unfortunately, the World Values Survey questionnaire, starting from the 5th wave, does not contain religious beliefs (previously it was present). The reason for removing questions about religious beliefs from the 5th wave questionnaire was probably the conclusion discussed above by P. Norris and R. Inglehart, who lead this study, that the importance of religion and religious practices is sufficient to build models in which religiosity is present46.

As already mentioned, an important issue when comparing data from different studies is the impact of the question wording on respondents ' responses. The analysis of this kind was carried out by P. Breshon, but was limited to questions of general religiosity. The article "Measuring Confessional Affiliation and Non-affiliation in Major European Studies" 47 compares the responses to the question of religion obtained in the European Values Survey (1999), the International Program for Social Research (1999) and the European Social Survey (2003). According to the results of P. Breshon, the formulation of the question of religion with a filter in the European Study of Values 48 gives a slightly lower percentage of believers in many European countries than the formulation without a filter used in the International Social Research Program.

As an example, let's compare the answers to the question about faith in God in the framework of two studies (the International Program for Social Research and the European Study of Values).-

46. Inglehart R., Norris P. Sacred and Secular. Religion and Politics Worldwide. Cambridge University Press, 2004.

47. Brechon P. The measuring of confessional membership and non-membership in major European surveys (La mesure de l'appartenance et de la non-appartenance confessionnelle dans les grandes enquetes europeennes) // Social Compass. 2009. Vol. 56. No 2.

48. The filter question reads as follows: "Do you practice any religion?". If the respondent answers "yes", they are asked: "What religion do you practice?".

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in the same period (2008) in the same countries, but with different wording of the question and different answers (table d).

Table 2.

Comparison of questions about faith in God

ISSP questionnaire question Which of the following statements most accurately reflects your attitude towards God today and in the past? (Give one answer)

EVS questionnaire question Do you believe in any of what I'm going to say? In God?

1. I don't believe in God now, and I never did before. 2.I don't believe in God now, but I used to. 3. I believe in God now, but I didn't before. 4. I believe in God now and always have. 8. It's hard to say

1. Yes 2. No 8. I don't know how to answer 9. Refusal to answer

The proportion of people who believe in God and those who found it difficult to answer the question about faith in God were not comparable between the two studies under consideration: the differences are not only statistically significant in most countries, but also significant from a meaningful point of view. The percentage of people who believe in God (Table 3) obtained using the EVS dichotomous question is significantly higher than the ISSP indicator, which combines faith in God in the present and in the past. At the same time, differences in some countries are compensated by negative responses, and in others - by the absence of an answer. This effect is probably due to firmness of faith. Respondents who are confident in their answer give similar answers with different formulations of the question, while those who hesitate, in a situation where it is necessary to think and analyze additional characteristics of their faith, such as, in this case, the chronological component, are more likely to give a negative answer or find it difficult to answer.

Only the proportions of those who do not believe in God were similar (the difference is statistically insignificant in more than half of the countries under consideration). The only country where the difference exceeds 10% was Latvia: in ISSP, the percentage of non-believers in God was 13% higher than in EVS. Russia, on the other hand, was the only country in which the share of non-believers in God according to EVS data significantly (by 8%) exceeded the ISSP result.

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Table 3. Answers to the question about faith in God

EVS

ISSP

% difference between EVS and ISSP

yes

no

no response

Base

Yes

no

no response

Base

yes

no

no response

Croatia

86

10

4

1498

77

9

14

1201

9*

1

-9*

Cyprus

96

2

2

999

80

6

14

1000

15*

-4*

- 12*

Czech

29

53

18

1793

24

61

15

1512

5*

-8*

3*

Denmark

58

34

7

1507

42

36

23

2004

17*

- 1

-15*

Finland

56

25

19

1134

42

28

30

1136

15*

-3

-11*

France

50

45

5

1501

37

44

19

2454

13*

1

-14*

Germany (Z)

67

24

9

1048

62

23

15

1182

4*

1

-6*

Germany (V.)

20

74

7

1003

19

72

9

524

1

2

-3

Irish

85

10

5

982

77

11

12

2049

8*

- 1

-7*

Latvia

69

21

9

1506

53

34

13

1069

16*-

-13*

-3*

Netherlands

55

40

5

1552

43

42

15

1951

12*

- 2

- 10*

Norway

54

43

3

1087

38

39

23

1072

16*

4

- 20*

Portugal

81

13

5

1553

85

11

4

1000

-4*

2

1

Russia

69

21

10

1490

56

13

31

1015

14*

8*

- 21*

Slovakia

74

17

9

1509

66

23

11

1138

8*

-5*

-3*

Slovenia

62

32

5

1366

51

30

19

1065

12*

2

- 13*

Spain

72

23

5

1497

69

23

8

2373

3*

0

-3*

Sweden

35

41

24

1174

30

42

28

1235

5*

0

-4*

Switzerland

68

23

9

1271

57

30

13

1229

11*

-7*

-4*

Turkey

99

1

1

2326

96

3

2

1453

3*

-2*

-1*

Ukraine

85

9

6

1507

73

11

16

2036

12*

- 2

- 10*

Great Britain

58

32

11

1549

42

35

23

1986

16*

-4*

- 12*

Northern Ireland

83

8

9

495

77

12

11

1089

5*

-4*

- 1

* An asterisk in the table indicates the percentage difference that is statistically significant at the level of p< 0.05.

Conclusion

We have considered two main characteristics that are highlighted in the study of individual religiosity in quantitative studies - the multidimensional nature and the hierarchical structure of this concept. In the framework of a multidimensional approach, religiosity

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it is considered as a certain integral system that can be evaluated by decomposing it into several axes, or dimensions (not always orthogonal). Within the framework of the hierarchical approach, two levels of analysis are distinguished: general religiosity and particular manifestations, and particular manifestations are usually the focus of the analysis. This is probably due to the fact that it was not possible to empirically substantiate the existence of a certain set of axes that together give a holistic view of religiosity, and a transition was made to a hierarchical approach to the study of this phenomenon, in which a holistic view of religiosity is no longer the main goal of analysis, but its individual components are studied.

As for the multidimensional approach, although no consensus has been reached on which dimensions should make up the concept of religiosity, it can be said that most authors distinguish the following axes: faith, practices and rituals, and knowledge.

Operationalizations of the concept of" religiosity " presented in major international studies, in addition to general-level religiosity, usually include the first two dimensions (religious beliefs and practices). However, despite the apparent similarity of the estimated parameters, it is necessary to pay very close attention to the last step of operationalization of the concept in the framework of empirical research, namely, to specific formulations of questions that often give significantly different results.

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