Page 127 - EMCAPP-Journal No. 7

Challenges for Christian Psychology

how the elements are structured (Durand, 2005, these three sub-scales of questionnaire on God
p.21-22). Therefore, data are mainly obtained in Image (QGI) in the current study.
the form of a drawing and a story-telling, fol-
lowed by a questionnaire (Durand, 2005). The Table 1. Relationships between QGI Dimensions
questionnaire allows one: a) to discover how Variables 1 2 3
the imagined story ends; b) to confirm parti- Positive Perception of God 1
cipants’ position in relation to the character of Positive Feelings for God 83** 1
the imagined story; c) to comprehend what are Negative Feelings for God -.41** -.45** 1
the symbolic meaning of the nine items drawn **p<.01, two-tailed.
by the participants. Depending on how these .
nine elements are assembled to create a unified Examples of results of the AT.9 Test and of the
drawing and story, it indicates the category into questionnaire on God image
which the individual’s imaginary falls: heroic,
mystical, DUEX (double existential containing This current report will show some examples
both heroic and mystical elements), synthetic of qualitative study done in the context of the
(symbolically integrated), or non-structured. first author doctoral thesis. Due to the limitati-
Lastly, the classification of the AT.9 is done with on of space, two relevant participants’ AT.9 will
the participation of at least 3 researchers; inter- be used to illustrate the relationship between
rater reliability is taken into account. structures of the imaginary in relation to ima-
ges of God ( see Figure 1 and Figure 2). First,
The Questionnaire on God image (QGI) Figure 1 clearly illustrates the synthetic cate-
The Dutch Questionnaire on God image (QGI, gory of the imaginary. Both the drawing and
Jonker, 2008) with a Likert format ranging the storytelling appear coherent and symbolic
from 1 ‘‘totally disagree’’ to 5 ‘‘totally agree’’ was in a meaningful manner (i.e. the love and the
used in the present study since it showed high protection of God in the context of adversity
psychometric properties. This questionnaire symbolized by the monster’s evil). The result of
consists of 33 items on a two dimension level: this AT.9 has also been examined in relation to
affective-cognitive. The affective dimension the results obtained from the questionnaire on
has three scales: 1) security/closeness: “When I God image. Concerning this questionnaire for
think of God I experience trust”, Cronbach α = this participant, the score of the Positive Feeling
0.93; 2) anxiety and guilt: “When I think of God on God image is 4.5 on a 5 point-Likert scale; a
I experience fear of not being good enough”, α score a 5 refers to a highest score).
= 0.94; and 3) feelings of discontent: “When I
think of God I experience dissatisfaction”, α =
0.75). The cognitive dimension also has three
scales; 1) supportive actions such as “God com-
forts me”, α = 0.98; 2) punishing/ ruling actions
such as ‘‘God exercises power, α = 0.71’’ and 3)
passivity: “God leaves people to their own de-
vices”, α = 0.76 (Schaap-Jonker, Eurelings-Bon-
tekoe, Verhagen, & Zock, 2002). To measure
GI among Vietnamese immigrants, the current
study refers to the two subscales: positive fee-
lings towards God (PFG) with 9 items such as
loving, affection and security (r = .86) and ne-
gative feelings towards God with 8 items such
as uncertainty, guilt, fear of not good enough (r
= .78) since these two subscales reflect Rizutto’s
theory and also have high level of internal con-
sistency. Table 1 shows the correlation between
Figure 1: Synthetic category
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