The purpose of this interdisciplinary study was to examine children's and
adolescents' (aged 6 to 16) thoughts of God that were hypothesized to reflect
the child's religious context and to be related to a child's cognitive maturity and
gender. The following four objectives guided the study: (1) to examine
children's thoughts of God within a particular religious school environment, (2) to
investigate age-related changes in children's representations of God as
indicated by their narrative texts, (3) to explore children's (female and male)
representations of God as described in their narrative texts, and (4) to suggest
transitions in the developmental structure of children's narrative texts about God
across levels of cognitive maturity.
The children (N=114) selected for the study were chosen from a Christian
school setting where religious instruction was part of the curriculum focus. Each
child, upon parental consent, participated in a one-to-one interview and
accomplished a series of developmental tasks including generating a story about
God, responding to a story about Jesus, answering questions about God, and
completing a short memory task. Parents were asked to complete a
questionnaire about religious life inside and outside the family home. A review
of the religious education curriculum was conducted. The collected data were
analyzed using both qualitative and quantitative research methodologies.
The results were fourfold. First, the study found that the religious school
environment (e.g., religious education program and religious activities both
inside and outside the family home) had the potential to influence children's
changing thoughts about God. Second, there were differences in female and
male representations of God. Third, there were significant changes in children's
representations of God as they matured. These changes were based not only
on children's cognitive maturity but also as a result of the children's religious
knowledge acquired within their religious environment. Also, these changes
reflected unique subtle differences in children's conceptual understandings of
God. Fourth, as children cognitively matured, there were changes in the
structure of their narratives about God. These changes paralleled the narrative
structure posited by McKeough (1992a) and the stages and substages posited
by Case (1992a). / Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies / Graduate
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UBC/oai:circle.library.ubc.ca:2429/9593 |
| Date | 11 1900 |
| Creators | Smoliak, Wendy Gay |
| Source Sets | University of British Columbia |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, Thesis/Dissertation |
| Format | 18321922 bytes, application/pdf |
| Rights | For non-commercial purposes only, such as research, private study and education. Additional conditions apply, see Terms of Use https://open.library.ubc.ca/terms_of_use. |
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