Compare methods

	Religious Doubt Scale	God Image Measurement
Field	Religious Studies	Religious Studies
Family	Latent structure	Latent structure
Year of origin	2002	1973
Originator	Bruce Hunsberger, Michael Pratt & S. Mark Pancer	Peter Benson & Bernard Spilka
Type	Latent measure of degree of religious doubting	Multidimensional latent measure of God representation
Seminal source	Hunsberger, B., Pratt, M., & Pancer, S. M. (2002). A longitudinal study of religious doubts in high school and beyond: Relationships, stability, and searching for answers. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 41(2), 255-266.	Benson, P., & Spilka, B. (1973). God image as a function of self-esteem and locus of control. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 12(3), 297-310.
Aliases	Religious Doubts Measure, Hunsberger Doubt Scale, Doubting About Religion Scale, Religious Questioning Measure	God Image Inventory, God Concept Measurement, God Representation Scale, Loving-Controlling God Image
Related	3	3
Summary	The Religious Doubt Scale, associated with Bruce Hunsberger and colleagues, measures the extent to which a person doubts or questions religious beliefs and issues. Rather than asking only whether someone believes, it captures the often-overlooked experience of uncertainty — wondering whether God exists, whether scripture is true, whether evil disproves a loving deity, or whether one's tradition has things right. Respondents rate their level of doubt across a range of religious issues, and the items combine into an overall doubt score. Hunsberger, Pratt, and Pancer's longitudinal work followed religious doubts from high school into early adulthood, examining how stable doubts are, how they relate to other religious orientations such as quest and fundamentalism, and how a searching, answer-seeking stance figures in religious development.	God image measurement quantifies the emotional, relational picture a believer holds of God — not the doctrines they affirm, but how they experience the divine as, say, loving or wrathful, accepting or rejecting, near or distant, controlling or permissive. Peter Benson and Bernard Spilka's 1973 study established the empirical approach: they measured the God image along evaluative dimensions and showed that it is systematically tied to the self, with people higher in self-esteem and internal locus of control picturing a more loving and accepting God. The tradition distinguishes the God image (the affect-laden, experienced representation) from the God concept (the formally professed theological description) and measures the former as a multidimensional latent construct from ratings of attributed divine characteristics.