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Journal of Beliefs & Values: Studies in

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Own and perceived parental religiosity

and the quality of the parent–child
relationship
a a
Farah Fredericks & Abraham P. Greeff
a
Department of Psychology, University of Stellenbosch,
Stellenbosch, South Africa
Published online: 08 Jun 2015.

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To cite this article: Farah Fredericks & Abraham P. Greeff (2015) Own and perceived parental
religiosity and the quality of the parent–child relationship, Journal of Beliefs & Values: Studies in
Religion & Education, 36:2, 252-258, DOI: 10.1080/13617672.2015.1041787

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 Journal of Beliefs & Values, 2015
Vol. 36, No. 2, 252–258, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13617672.2015.1041787

RESEARCH REPORT
Own and perceived parental religiosity and the quality of the
parent–child relationship
Farah Fredericks and Abraham P. Greeff*

Department of Psychology, University of Stellenbosch, Stellenbosch, South Africa

This aim of this study was to investigate the association between perceived
parental religiosity and the quality of the parent–child relationship. Eighty-nine
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adolescent boys and girls completed the Santa Clara Strength of Religious Faith
Questionnaire (SCSRFQ) and the Parent–Child Relationship Survey (PCRS).
The results showed that the girls had a better relationship with their mothers than
with their fathers, while the boys tended to view their relationships with their
father and mother of equal quality. It was also found that greater perceived
religiosity of both the fathers and mothers was associated with a better parent–
child relationship.
Keywords: parent; child; religiosity; relationship; perceived

Religion, religious activities, rituals and ceremonies form part of the lives of
many individuals. Children are primarily socialised by their parents in all areas,
including religion. Parents generally are the largest influence of their children’s
religious beliefs and religious faith (Flor and Knapp 2001; Park and Eckland
2007). These aspects filter into interpersonal relationships and familial relation-
ships, and subsequently into the greater community and society. Parenting prac-
tices are elemental in the manner in which the child perceives the parent–child
relationship. Consequently, the present study examined how parental religiosity
and the parent–child relationship are associated and attempted to characterise
the religious dimension of the parent–child relationship, as perceived by the
adolescent child.
Religion is a multidimensional construct, the function and effects of which can
be observed sociologically and psychologically (Paloutzian and Kirkpatrick 1995).
A religion can be defined as a systematised set of beliefs with associated rituals and
moral values, all related to one’s relationship to the Divine. Many religions include
specific practices and guidelines for family and individual daily life, based on the
moral values and specific beliefs of the religion (Walsh and Pryce 2003). Religion
has often been used as a means by which values and discipline are instilled within
the family (Stokes and Regnerus 2009).
Different styles of parenting have been found to have different effects on the
child. Thus, the roles of the parents as ascribed by their religious affiliation probably
play an important part in their parenting style and the interactions within a family.
For example, the authoritative parenting style has been found to be related to good
psychosocial development and school performance, while poorer outcomes in these

*Corresponding author. Email: apg@sun.ac.za

© 2015 Taylor & Francis

 Journal of Beliefs & Values 253

areas have been found to be associated with authoritarian and permissive parenting
styles (Purdie, Carroll, and Roche 2004). Authoritarian parenting practices have
been associated with rigid and staunch religious beliefs and practices by parents –
which may have an adverse effect on the parent–child relationship as well as on
how the child attaches meaning to religious faith. Permissive parenting is charac-
terised by not maintaining clear boundaries. This could be particularly problematic
during adolescence, a time when children are transitioning to young adulthood and
still need plenty of guidance in decision-making (Purdie, Carroll, and Roche 2004).
Studies of US and Israeli samples showed that, when young adults adopt a
religion different from that of their family of origin, relationships between family
members can be destabilised (Roer-Strier and Sands 2001). If a child chooses to
practice religion differently from the parent, or will not engage in the religious
activities traditional in that family, family relationships could also become strained.
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Similarly, if a child chooses to engage more intensely in religious activities than the
parent, that also stresses the parent–child relationship. This is particularly true if the
parents are not as involved in religion as the child (Aviad 1983).
Research conducted in the US found that religious concordance – religious
harmony or religious agreement between a parent and child – is related to less con-
flicted relationships between generations (Stokes and Regnerus 2009). One of the
aspects of concordance is religious salience, defined as how a person views his or
her religiosity in terms of importance and place in his or her life. Thus, religious sal-
ience may have more effect on the parent–child relationship compared to other areas
of religion, such as regular churchgoing or the attendance of religious activities or
festivals (Pearce and Axinn 1998). What thus seems to be important is the meaning
attached to religiosity, rather than participation in the activities or rituals of a particu-
lar religion. Similarly, Stokes and Regnerus (2009) contend that, while attending
church or affiliating with a religion can be done in a superficial manner, in adoles-
cence, religious adherence often suggests religious commitment on a deeper level.
Myers (2004) suggests that religious congruence, i.e. belonging to the same denom-
ination or attending the same church, affects the quality of the relationship between
the child and parent more than individual religious characteristics. Also, the effect
that religiosity has on the parent–child relationship is likely moderated by sex, kind
of religious affiliation, and the structure of the family.
Given that parental religiosity may affect family relationships, the present study
explored the association between parental religiosity, defined by the adolescent
child’s perception of his or her parents’ religious faith, and the children’s evaluation
of the quality of their relationship with their parent. It was hypothesised that signifi-
cant positive relationships exist between own and perceived parental religiosity, as
well as between own religiosity and the quality of the parent–child relationship.

Method
Participants
The sample consisted of 89 adolescent students (M age = 16.5, SD = .95; 37 male,
52 female) from two secondary public schools located in the northern suburbs of
Cape Town, South Africa. Participants were both Afrikaans (one of the official
South African languages, originating from Dutch) and English speaking. Inclusion
criteria were that the participant should: (1) be a high school student in grade 11; (2)
 254 F. Fredericks and A.P. Greeff

be residing with his or her parent or parents; (3) be between 16- and 19-years-old;
and (4) have returned a parental consent form prior to completing the questionnaires.
Grade 11 classes, with 35 to 45 students per class, were randomly identified from
each school and approached to take part in the study. Since the target participants
were all below the age of 21 years, parental consent forms were sent home with the
adolescents interested in participating in the research study.
To ensure sample homogeneity, adolescents who were not from two-parent fami-
lies (n = 21), and those from religious backgrounds other than Christian (n = 4),
were omitted. Eleven questionnaires were incomplete and also discounted. Thus, of
the 125 completed questionnaires, 89 were eligible for use in the study. The mean
age of the fathers was 47.3 (SD = 5.82) and that of the mothers was 45.2 years
(SD = 5.03).
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Measures
All the measures were available in English and Afrikaans. One bilingual translator
had done a translation from English into Afrikaans and a second translator translated
the measures into English again. Each item was compared to control for possible
changes in conceptual meaning. Biographical information was gathered using a
structured questionnaire, and the other variables were assessed using self-report
measures.
Biographical information. Information regarding the family composition, the
parents’ ages, the adolescent child’s age and sex, as well as the family’s type of
religion, was obtained with a biographical questionnaire.
The Santa Clara Strength of Religious Faith Questionnaire (Plante and Boccaccini
1997). The Santa Clara Strength of Religious Faith Questionnaire (SCSRFQ) mea-
sures religiosity independent from religious affiliation, using 10 self-report items.
Items are rated on a four-point Likert-type scale with anchors 1 = strongly disagree to
4 = strongly agree. The range of the possible total score was 10 to 40. Higher scores
suggest greater religiosity. Permission was granted by Thomas Plante (personal
communication, 8 March 2009) to adapt the SCSRFQ so that it measures both the
mother’s and the father’s religiosity as perceived by their adolescent child. This was
done by adapting each item to refer to either ‘my mother’ or ‘my father’. For
example, ‘My religious faith is extremely important to me’ was changed to: ‘My
mother’s religious faith is extremely important to her’. High internal reliability has
been found for the SCSRFQ (alphas .94 to –.95), as well as high split-half reliability
(.90 to –.96), while discriminant and convergent validity were found for undergradu-
ate college student samples (Plante and Boccaccini 1997). In the present study,
Cronbach’s alpha was found to be .9 for the mother’s perceived religiosity, .92 for the
father’s perceived religiosity, and .88 for own religiosity.
The Parent–Child Relationship Survey (Fine, Worley, and Schwebel 1985). The
Parent–Child Relationship Survey (PCRS) has two parallel scales, which measure
the quality of the mother and child and the father and child relationships. Each of
these two scales has 24 items, which are rated on a 7-point Likert-type scale, rang-
ing from 1 = not at all to 7 = extremely, with possible total scores ranging from 24
to 168 (Fine, Worley, and Schwebel 1985). An example of an item is: ‘How well do
you communicate with your mother?’ The PCRS has very good internal consistency
for both the father (alpha = .96) and the mother (alpha = .94) scales (Fisher and
Corcoran 2007). According to Fisher and Corcoran (2007), the PCRS has acceptable
 Journal of Beliefs & Values 255

levels of predictive and discriminative validity. In the present study, the internal
reliability was .88 for the mother–child relationship scale and .94 for the father–
child relationship scale.

Procedure
After permission was granted by the governing bodies of the schools for the
research to be conducted, an initial visit was undertaken to the schools to introduce
the study to the adolescent students in the identified classes. Only those students
who had permission from their parents could participate in the study. The schools
then were revisited to administer the questionnaires. On these occasions, the proce-
dural aspects of completing the questionnaires were explained to the participants,
after which the two self-report questionnaires and a biographical questionnaire were
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handed to the participants to be completed. Once the questionnaires were completed,

they were given to the designated grade 11 head educator, who noted that no queries
were raised regarding completion.

Data analysis
Mixed model repeated measures ANOVA were done to compare the means for the
SCRFQ at the levels of the three different persons (self, mother and father), and for
the PCRS at two levels (mother and father). Pearson product-moment correlations
were ascertained to examine the relationships between variables. For all analyses,
the usual assumptions were checked and judged not to have influenced any conclu-
sions drawn from the results. Significance was set at p < 0.05 for all tests.

Results
Scores were obtained from the student participants for religious faith (self, perceived
father’s and perceived mother’s) measured with the SCSRFQ, and for the quality of
the parent–child relationship (father–child and mother–child) measured with the
PCRS. For both the SCSRFQ and the PCRS, a one-way ANOVA showed no signifi-
cant differences between the means of the two language groups (English and
Afrikaans), and no significant differences due to the sex of the participants (male or
female). On the SCSRFQ, a number of two-way and three-way ANOVAs were con-
ducted to assess the possible interaction effects of the following variables: participant
sex, participant language, and the three measures of religiosity (own religion, father’s
perceived religion, and mother’s perceived religion). The results showed no signifi-
cant interactions for any combination of these three variables (p > .05). Similarly, on
the PCRS, a number of two-way and three-way ANOVAs were conducted to assess
possible interaction effects between participant sex, participant language, and the two
parent–child relationship quality measures (father–child and mother–child). The
results for the PCRS revealed no significant interaction for any combination of these
three variables at the 5% significance level. However, it must be noted that a two-
way ANOVA between the sex of the participants and the two PCRS parent–child
measures was significant at the 10% level (F1,71 = 3.3, p = .07). Fisher’s Least
Significant Difference post hoe testing showed that girls had significantly higher
scores for the quality of their mother–daughter relationship than their father–daughter
relationships (p = .001). Girls also scored this mother–daughter relationship higher
 256 F. Fredericks and A.P. Greeff

than boys scored their mother–son (p = 0.01) and father–son (p < 0.01) relationships.
There was little difference in how boys perceived the quality of the relationship with
their respective parents (p = .5). The descriptive statistics for the five measures are
shown in Table 1.
From Table 1 it follows that the mean Likert scores on the three SCSRFQ reli-
giosity measures were not equal, with a one-way ANOVA showing a significant
effect (F2,82 = 5, p < .01). Fisher LSD post hoc testing confirmed that the father’s
perceived religiosity scores were significantly lower than that of the mothers’
perceived religiosity (p < .01) and the participants’ own religiosity (p = .01). A
one-way ANOVA comparing mean (Likert) scores from the two PCRS measures
showed a significant effect (F1,71 = 7.8, p < .01), with the mother–child relationship
scoring significantly higher than the father–child relationship. However, as noted
above, the difference in these two means is probably due to the higher ratings the
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girls gave to their mother–daughter relationships – a difference not reflected in the

scores of the male participants.
Pearson correlations were calculated between religious faith (own, father’s per-
ceived and mother’s perceived) and the quality of the parent–child relationships
(mother–child and father–child). The coefficients are shown in Table 2.
According to Table 2, four of the eight calculated correlations were significantly
positive (p < .05). These results are discussed further on.

Discussion
The study examined the association between religiosity of self and parents, and the
quality of the relationship between parents and a child, as indicated by the adoles-
cent child. The possible effects of sex (male and female participants) and person
(mother–child and father–child relationship; and religiosity of self, mother and
father) were investigated in this study. Overall, the quality of the mother–child rela-
tionship was perceived as significantly higher than that of the father–child relation-
ship. However, on closer inspection, the children’s scores on the PCRS showed that
girls believed they had a better relationship with their mothers than they did with
their fathers, whereas the boys tended to view these mother–son and father–son
relationships equally. Looking at perceived religiosity, the fathers’ religiosity was
evaluated significantly lower than the religiosity of both the mothers and the
participating children. The analyses showed that the sex of the participant was not
significantly associated with the evaluation of religiosity (own, perceived father’s or
perceived mother’s religiosity).

Table 1. Descriptive statistics for the variables religiosity (4-point Likert items) and quality
of the parent–child relationship (7-point Likert Items) (N = 89).
Mean Likert score Standard deviation
Own religiosity 3.22 0.42
Father’s perceived religiosity 2.87 0.68
Mother’s perceived religiosity 3.29 0.57
Father–child relationship 4.83 0.96
Mother–child relationship 5.12 0.72
 Journal of Beliefs & Values 257

Table 2. Pearson correlations between religiosity and quality of the parent–child relationship
(N = 89).
Father’s Mother’s Own reli- Father–child Mother–child
religiosity r religiosity r giosity r relationship r relationship r
Father’s – .47 (<.01) .25 (.09) .43 (<.01) .29 (.04)
religiosity
Mother’s – .11 (.50) .11 (.48) .35 (.02)
religiosity
Own – .13 (.30) .19 (.13)
religiosity
Father–child – .45 (<.001)
relationship
Mother–child –
relationship
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A significant correlation was found between perceived father’s religiosity and

the quality of the father–child relationship, which means that greater religiosity of
the fathers was associated with a stronger father–child relationship. Likewise,
perceived mother’s religiosity and the quality of the mother–child relationship were
significantly correlated, meaning that the greater the religiosity of the mother, the
greater the perceived quality of the mother–child relationship. As can be expected,
mothers’ perceived religiosity and fathers’ perceived religiosity was significantly
correlated, as well as the quality of the mother–child and father–child relationships.
Both the mothers’ and the fathers’ perceived religiosity did not correlate signifi-
cantly with the participants’ own religiosity. Although Purdie, Carroll, and Roche
(2004) theory about parental style and the internalisation of religious beliefs was not
investigated, both mothers and fathers were perceived to have moderate levels of
religiosity.
What follows from the results is that the more religious the parent was perceived
to be, the better the parent–child relationship was reported to be. The fact that the
lowest scores on the SCSRFQ were the fathers’ (see Table 1) is an occurrence that
has been reported previously (Bartkowski, Xu, and Levin 2008; Flor and Knapp
2001; Pearce and Axinn 1998; Purdie, Carroll, and Roche 2004).
There were two other significant findings. Firstly, the perceived religiosity of the
mothers was significantly more than those of the fathers. Secondly, the quality of
the relationship between the child and the mother was rated significantly better than
the quality of the relationship between the child and the father. Although the partici-
pants’ sex did not have a statistically significant interaction effect on the evaluation
of the measured variables at the 5% level, there was some indication that girls gave
their relationships with their mothers a higher rating than that with their fathers,
whereas boys give both parents equal ratings. This needs to be verified in future
research with a more expansive sample.
The limitations of this study are the absence of qualitative data, which could
have added to the enrichment of the information gained, as well as the fact that the
research group represented only two-parent families from one religion. Recom-
mendations for further research would entail the inclusion of participants from
different religions and diverse family structures, as well as a more detailed look at
the nature and extent of faith and religiosity. A more complete view of parental
 258 F. Fredericks and A.P. Greeff

religiosity and its association with the quality of the parent–child relationship could
also be obtained by including parents as participants in future studies.

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors
Farah Fredericks completed her post graduate studies in Psychology at the University of
Stellenbosch, South Africa.

Abraham P. Greeff is a registered Counselling Psychologist and a professor in Psychology at

the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa.
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