A MULTIDIMENSIONAL MEASURE OF RELIGIOUS INVOLVEMENT FOR AFRICAN-AMERICANS

This article describes the confirmation and validation of a multidimen sional measure of religious involvement using data from the National S urvey of Black Americans (N = 2,107). This model was developed through a multistep strategy of confirmatory factor analysis and structural-e quation modeling. First, a three-dimensional factor structure comprisi ng organizational, nonorganizational, and subjective religiosity was c onfirmed for twelve religious indicators. This measurement model was f ound to exhibit excellent overall fit; it compared favorably to altern ative models; and all hypothesized factor loadings were strong and sta tistically significant. Second, several constructs identified by prior research as correlates of religious involvement (gender, age, educati on, region, and urbanicity) were found to exhibit significant associat ions with one or more dimensions of the model. All analyses were condu cted in LISREL 8.03, using maximum-likelihood estimation and a strateg y of split-sample replication.