Salāmat-i ijtimā̒ī (Dec 2016)
Construction and Standardization of Spiritual Experiences Scale (SES)
Abstract
Background and Objective: Spirituality as a cultural fact is one of the principles that will affect many aspects of life. This research aims to build a scale to assess and evaluate the reliability and validity of spiritual experiences and its exploratory factor structure.Materials and Methods: The research was a correlational study. The study population included all employees of the Shahid Beheshti University, including 220 participants (105 females and 115 males) with the stratified sampling and proportional allocation method and Cohen's d formula, were selected. The instrument was spiritual experience scale (SES). For assessing the internal validity of instrument correlation coefficient was used for each question and the total score categories. The exploratory factor analysis was conducted on the 25 items of the scale. internal consistency was evaluated by Cronbach's alpha and retest was used for concurrent validity.Results: In the initial factor analysis, three factors were obtained with the particular value of greater than 1 and second factor analysis was limited to these three factors. Based on the content of the material three factors were named "personal relationship with God," "communication and perception beyond" and "the presence of God and receive spiritual support." The internal consistency of this scale was good (Cronbach's alpha, 93.0 and repeatability within ten days, 78.0).Conclusion: The study showed that the spiritual experience scale in Iranian society was valid and reliable. So self-report scale is a useful tool for research purposes.
