Measures of spiritual and transpersonal constructs for use in yoga research

This article presents information on standardized paper-and-pencil measures of spiritual and transpersonal constructs that hold promise for use in yoga research. Nine instruments are discussed at length including the Assessment Schedule for Altered States of Consciousness, Ego Grasping Orientation, Expressions of Spirituality Inventory, Hindu Religious Coping Scale, Measures of Hindu Pathways, Self-Expansiveness Level Form, Spiritual Orientation Inventory, Spiritual Transcendence Scale, and the Vedic Personality Inventory. As well, a listing of an additional 14 measures, along with primary citations, is provided. In conclusion, the authors proffer recommendations for the use of psychometric tests and provide a general proposal for programmatic research.

INTRODUCTION an ally and not an enemy of investigators interested in the study of spiritual and transpersonal concepts and practices. In this vein, the purpose of this article is to provide information about available assessment instruments that appear promising for use by yoga researchers and/or transpersonally oriented studies involving Indian samples.
In total, nine measures are presented at length [Table 1a-c], and an additional 14 are listed in Table 2. Based upon our previous test survey publications [2][3][4] as well as a perusal of literature published from 1999 to present through a variety of online databases (e.g., PubMed, PsycINFO), we identified several instruments that either measure a construct of central importance to spiritual and transpersonal studies (e.g., altered states of consciousness, spirituality, methods of transformation, etc.) and/or have been utilized in at least one cross-cultural study. Because of space limitations, we arbitrarily selected only nine of the tests that we thought would be of greatest interest to readers, who are invited to look at our previous works for a survey of more than a hundred measures.

Table 1a
Summary of key information about tests presented Table 1c Summary of key information about tests presented Table 2 Some additional measures of potential interest to investigators doing yoga, spiritual and/or transpersonal research Table 1b Summary of key information about tests presented

Assessment schedule for altered states of consciousness
The assessment schedule for altered states of consciousness (ASASC) was developed by VanQuekelberghe, Altstotter-Gleich, and Hertweck [5] to serve as a comprehensive measure of altered or nonordinary states of consciousness. The construction of the test was guided by extant taxonomies and definitions of altered states offered by several seminal writers in the area including Fischer, [6] Gowan, [7] Tart, [8,9] and most importantly Ludwig. [10] The instrument is made up of 325 items which are unevenly divided across 14 subscales. The subscales all utilize the same five-point response scale (ranging from 0 = not at all to 4 = completely) and each has its own instructions so that they can be used separately if desired. The subscales are as follows: Personal data (i.e., demographics and background information about behaviors associated with nonordinary states of consciousness such as drug use, meditation, and psychotherapy), Extraordinary Mental Processes (i.e., unusual thought patterns, strange ideas, Measures of spiritual and transpersonal constructs for use in yoga research http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3017962/?tool=pubmed highly unusual experiences), Parapsychology-Own Experiences (i.e., personal experiences of parapsychological phenomena), Parapsychology-Own View (i.e., estimates of the probability of occurrence of parapsychological events), Esoterics (i.e., engaging in practices associated with metaphysical and paranormal phenomena such as astrology, séances, spiritual healing), Positive Mystical Experiences (i.e., ecstatic states of consciousness similar to peak experiences), Negative Mystical Experiences (i.e., extreme negative experiences such as feeling surrounded by evil forces), Imagination (i.e., imagination and visualization ability), Dreams (i.e., preoccupation with dreams and frequency of occurrence of different types of dreams), Dissociation (i.e., tendencies toward trance-like and dissociative states), Hallucinations (i.e., images and mental processes generally associated with psychopathological hallucinatory states), Hypersensitiveness (i.e., heightened body sensitivity, synesthetic experiences), Changed Feeling of Time and Space, and Change (i.e., long term effects of nonordinary states on personal functioning and development).
The psychometric properties of the ASASC subscale scores appear to be generally satisfactory as reflected in good interitem reliability coefficients, favorable factor analytic and multidimensional scaling findings, and theoretically expected subscale intercorrelations. The instrument also appears to be unaffected by a variety of demographic variables including age, education, and religious denomination. Finally, the ASASC has been used to develop score profiles for discrete groups of respondents including those who have had drug experiences, people who engage in esoteric practices, and people suffering from a variety of forms of psychopathology including heroine addiction, major depression, and schizophrenia-as documented in one of our review articles. [2] Ego grasping orientation Knoblauch and Falconer[11] based the ego grasping orientation (EGO) upon the adaptation of the Taoist concepts of yin-yang, wu-wei, andteto psychotherapy. The EGO is a measure of Taoist orientation that assesses the construct of ego grasping, defined by Knoblauch [12] as "a dualistic stance that is marked by the person's attempts to make things more positive while striving to eliminate the negative aspects of human experience" (p. 55). Knoblauch argued that a person high in ego grasping would be seen from a Taoist perspective as being egocentric and prone to egoic idealism.
Items for the EGO were developed based upon statements made by clients in psychotherapy that were perceived by the test authors as supporting the notion of ego grasping. The instrument is made up of 20 true/false self-descriptive statements. Respondents are asked to indicate whether or not each of the statements is true in describing their beliefs and behavior. Scoring of the instrument involves reverse scoring negative items and then summing items responded to in the direction of ego grasping. Higher EGO scores are associated with higher levels of ego grasping.
The EGO has been found with North American samples to produce scores that demonstrate satisfactory reliability (both test-retest and interitem) and good convergent, discriminant, and criterion validity, as referenced in one of our review articles. [2] Expressions of spirituality inventory MacDonald [13,14]  Test construction started with extensive qualitative interviews of a sample of 15 Hindus. Based upon the analysis of the narratives, five functions of religious coping were identified by the test authors (i.e., to find meaning, to gain control, to gain comfort and closeness to God, to gain intimacy with others, and to achieve a life transformation) that were seen as consistent with the functions for religious coping found in American Christian samples. Next, items from existing religious coping scales that were seen as reflecting these functions were selected and revised to be more consistent with Hindu religious concepts and tenets. Where items did not exist on an available test, new items were written. An initial 23-item version of the test was piloted on a sample of 42 Hindus. After revising the test, which included the deletion of three items, the HRCS was then administered to a sample of 164 Hindus. Exploratory principal components analysis of 18 of the 20 remaining items produced three components labeled "God-Focused" Religious Coping (i.e., use of belief in God as manner of coping; God identified as both the source and solution to problems), "Spirituality-focused" Religious Coping (i.e., nontheistic use of spirituality to cope with problems such as seeking out spiritual awakening), and "Religious Guilt, Anger, and Passivity" (i.e., negative religious coping involving a nonassertive stance toward problems and/or feelings of anger or guilt arising from perception of God as being malevolent or unhelpful). In its final form, the HRCS consists of 20 items of which 18 are assigned to three subscales corresponding to the three components described earlier. The measure uses a four-point response scale ranging from 1= "haven't been doing this at all" to 4= "have been doing this a lot" that test takers use to rate the extent to which they engage in the behavior specified by each item. Subscale scores are derived by summing responses to relevant items. Higher scores are associated with higher levels of use of religious coping strategies for any given subscale.
Psychometrically, Tarakeshwar et al. [16] reported satisfactory inter-item consistency coefficients Measures of spiritual and transpersonal constructs for use in yoga research http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3017962/?tool=pubmed for the three subscales (ranging from 0.69 to 0.85). Further, some evidence of convergent and discriminant validity through correlations within the subscales and between the subscales and demographic variables and measure of response bias (i.e., social desirability) was provided. Last, hierarchical regressions revealed that God-Focused Religious coping was a significant positive predictor of life satisfaction and Religious Guilt, Anger, and Passivity was a significant negative predictor of life satisfaction, marital satisfaction, and a significant positive predictor of depressed mood.

Measures of hindu pathways
Tarakeshwar, Pargament, and Mahoney [17] developed the measures of hindu pathways (MHP) to provide a measure of Hindu beliefs and practices as incorporated into daily living. More specifically, the MHP is designed to provide a quantitative measure of the religious practices or The test authors report good interitem reliability coefficients for all three of the multi-item scales (alphas range from 0.76 to 0.89), evidence of score validity was also obtained, and they found the four scales to be weakly to modestly intercorrelated with each other and to be uncorrelated to social desirability. [17] In this same article, they reported analyses with demographic variables that uncovered significant correlations with age, marital status, and level of acculturation, as well as regression analyses that revealed that the one or more of the four paths served as significant predictors of life satisfaction, depressed mood, physical health, and marital satisfaction. It is noteworthy, however, that the Path of Devotion was found to be a positive predictor of depressed mood (such that greater use of this path was associated with higher depression) and a negative predictor of martial satisfaction (such that greater use of this path was associated with lower marital satisfaction), while the Path of Yoga was also found to be a negative predictor of marital satisfaction.

Self-expansiveness level form
Friedman [18] designed the self-expansiveness level form (SELF) as one of the first paperand-pencil instruments constructed to tap an explicitly transpersonal construct. It is an 18-item test that measures self-expansiveness or the extent to which one's experienced sense of self corresponds to the "True Self" as defined in the spiritual, mystical, and transpersonal literature.
That is, the SELF assesses self-concept expansiveness or the degree to which the self-concept is inclusive of reality as understood from a transpersonal perspective. Grounded in a spatialtemporal cartography developed as a conceptual framework, the SELF is made up of three subscales named the Personal (i.e., here and now), Transpersonal (expanded and contracted spatiality and temporality), and the Middle (i.e., those potentials of the self-concept lying between the personal and transpersonal). Respondents use a five-point Likert-type response scale to rate the extent to which they are willing to identify with the differing levels of the self-concept as delineated by the subscale items. Scoring involves numerically coding responses and then summing the items to arrive at three subscale scores.
Research with North American samples has shown that the SELF subscale scores demonstrate good reliability and adequate criterion, factorial and discriminant validity[2,3] but somewhat weaker convergent validity. [19] With an Indian sample, the SELF has been found to produce somewhat less reliable scores and factor analysis of the SELF Personal and Transpersonal items with data obtained from this Indian sample generated partial support for the factorial validity of the test with the Personal subscale demonstrating greater robustness than the transpersonal subscale. [20] Spiritual orientation inventory Consequently, scoring of the instrument first requires reverse coding negatively worded items before summing the item responses to arrive at nine subscale scores. A total SOI score could be obtained by simply summing the nine subscale scores.
Available research suggests that with North American samples, the SOI produces scores of adequate reliability and validity. [2] Of interest to its cross-cultural properties, Zainuddin [22] used data obtained from a sample of 219 Indian Muslim Teachers to factor analyze the SOI subscales.
Results suggest that the SOI demonstrates a two-factor structure wherein one factor is an experiential factor and the second is a values factor. These results are similar to a factor analytic study done by MacDonald [13] where the SOI subscales, along with 10 other measures of spirituality and associated constructs, were found to contribute to factors related to spiritual experience, spiritual beliefs, and the products of spirituality with data obtained from a sample of 534 Canadian university students.
to another state of being (p. 995). Finally, Universality is referred to as "a belief in the unity and purpose of life; a feeling that all life is interconnected and a sense of a shared responsibility of one creature to another" (p. 995). Respondents are provided a five-point response scale ranging from 1= strongly agree to 5= strongly disagree to rate how much they agree with the item as being applicable to themselves. In addition to a self-report version of the test, Piedmont also developed a parallel peer-rating form. The only difference between the two measures is that the items for the later version are written in the third as opposed to first person. Scores for the subscales are derived by summing item scores. A total STS score can be generated by summing all item scores.
Data on the psychometric properties of the STS with American samples suggest that scores from both the self-report and peer-report versions of the test are adequately reliable (e.g., alphas ranging from 0.64 to 0.91 across all scales and both tests) and, as importantly, there is evidence supporting the validity of scores with American respondents (e.g., Piedmont found through both exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis that the STS items clearly fit a three-factor structure and demonstrated convergent and discriminant validity, criterion validity, and incremental validity [i.e., the ability to predict the psychosocial outcomes listed and beyond personality variables]). [23,24] Outside of American samples, the STS has not fared as well, though it still holds promise; using a sample of 273 Indian students, of which 218 were Hindu, 87 Christian, and 64 Muslim, Piedmont and Leach [25] found the STS to have marginal inter-item consistency (e.g., for the total sample, alpha coefficients ranged between 0.23 and 0.67 for the subscales; alpha was 0.71 for the total scale). A confirmatory factor analysis of STS items found only partial support for instrument test of the three-factor structure resulted in inconsistent fit statistics. Deletion of the Connectedness subscale items resulted in an improvement in the model fit. Piedmont and Leach concluded that this provides supportive evidence for the remaining two STS subscales. On a more positive note, predictive and incremental validity was found to be comparable to that observed with American samples.

Vedic personality inventory
Wolf [26] developed the vedic personality inventory (VPI) was to test the validity of the Vedic concept of the three gunas (i.e., modes of nature; sattva, rajas, tamas) and to determine its utility as a psychological typology. Using the Vedic literature as the basis for conceptual development and item construction, the initial form the test consisted of 90 items divided across three subscales corresponding to the three gunas and employed a seven-point Likert scale response format.
Based upon an item-level factor analysis with a sample of 247 Americans, 10 items were dropped from the test, leaving a total of 80 items. Reliability analyses suggest the VPI has good interitem consistency (alphas in excess of .85 for all three scales). In addition, Wolf produced evidence of convergent and discriminant validity. Further psychometric work done by Wolf [27] with a sample of 619 Americans resulted in the test being shortened to 56 items. Reliability of the subscales in the shortened test continued to be satisfactory (α > 0.90). Moreover, Wolf found further evidence of construct validity as manifest in theoretically expected correlations with conceptually similar and dissimilar measures. Additional psychometric support for the VPI was generated by Stempel, Cheston, Greer, and Gillespie [28] who found the scales of the VPI to correlate in a theoretically expected manner with measures of daily spiritual experiences and psychopathology.

RECOMMENDATIONS FOR RESEARCH
Although it may be helpful for the reader to know of the existence of measures that may be effective for use in yoga (and, more generally, spiritual/transpersonal) research, to simply give information on available tests related to spiritual and transpersonal constructs is not sufficient.
Despite the fact that there are well more than 100 instruments in the published literature, and many more if we include explicit measures of religiousness, we have noted that there is little

A PROGRAM OF RESEARCH
In essence, these recommendations can be consolidated into a general multilayered and open-ended program of research that takes into consideration the complexities of the phenomena of interest, while bringing transpersonal science more into alignment with the manner in which mainstream psychological science works. Figure 1 provides a graphic representation of the research program using spirituality as an example.
Measures of spiritual and transpersonal constructs for use in yoga research http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3017962/?tool=pubmed  At the first and most substantive tier, systematic qualitative (e.g., interviews, literature reviews) and quantitative (e.g., tests, meta-analyses), research is needed to identify the features of human experience and functioning that comprise whatever it is that an investigator considers spiritual or with qualitative studies (e.g., focus groups, interviews, psychohistorical and phenomenological analyses) that seek to confirm the "fit" of the construct to a person's beliefs and experience.
As an integral part of defining the nomological net, the second important tier of the proposed research program involves giving considerable attention to the critical and rigorous examination of the psychometric properties of available measures, including investigations into their validity and utility with different cultural and developmental groups. As deficiencies and limitations of tests are identified, especially as they relate to their underlying theoretical bases, researchers should develop revised models and measurement instruments which, in turn, can be the focus of further study.
As the nomological net is created, replicated and extended, the third tier of the research program comes into effect. Core constructs (i.e., concepts whose nature and empirical relations have been Measures of spiritual and transpersonal constructs for use in yoga research http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3017962/?tool=pubmed 06/02/2011 19:53 robustly supported in both theory and research) should serve as the basis of study into the relation of spiritual and transpersonal theory to other domains of human functioning including well-being, health, psychopathology, social functioning, personality, intelligence, and so forth.
Although research can be done at the level of one or more of the tiers concurrently, third tier research really should only start after sufficient and verifiable knowledge about the nature and validity of the transpersonal construct that we want to study has been obtained. To proceed without such knowledge is to run the risk of perpetuating current practices and deepening the confusion about the veracity and significance of spiritual and transpersonal constructs for psychological science.

CONCLUSION
We hope that the information presented in this article serves as a catalyst for new avenues of