Person, Culture & Religion Group

The Identity Marketplace:
Conceptualizing Religious Identity Development
for Research and Spiritual Care in Pluralistic Societies

With the influence of postmodern globalization, scholars acknowledge that achieving and sustaining an identity is under an increasing tension pulled into a marketplace of meanings as countries, cultures, and faith communities are brought into an evolving awareness of and interaction with each other. The latest research in identity posits that there is not one identity, but multiple identity domains for each person, i.e. ethnic, sexual, familial identity domains. Grounded in developmental contextualism and identity status theory, the paper reframes the question of how religion influences overall identity to investigating how religious identity is a cognitively unique process for individuals and should be attended to by researchers and spiritual caregivers. Four psychosocial statuses of religious identity are proposed and explained. Recognizing these religious identity statuses is crucial to understanding the formation and development of religious identity and overall spiritual development.

Several academic fields from both the humanities and social sciences use ‘identity’ as a central concept from which to characterize the individualized issues related to the shifting socio-cultural contexts in modernity. Variously describing this context as postmodern, pluralistic, and post-capitalistic globalization, scholars acknowledge that achieving and sustaining an identity is under an increasing tension pulled from a marketplace of meanings as countries, cultures, and faith communities are brought into an increasing awareness of each other (Schweitzer, 2004; Lifton, 1993; Pinxten, Verstraete, & Longman, 2004). Recent work in the social scientific study of identity has shown that individuals hold multiple identities currently understood as identity domains (Cote, 2006; Goosens, 2001). Within a developmental contextual model, the unexplored domain of religious identity can be conceptualized with four statuses of development, related to Marcia’s four statuses of ego identity synthesis (Marcia, 1966). This paper demonstrates the usefulness of such a model of religious identity development as it acknowledges the multiple identities and statuses of postmodern individuals as well as offering a more precise therapeutic framework from which to offer spiritual care.

Erik Erikson’s (1963) original emphasis on the ego’s achievement of identity highlighted the importance for each individual to be able to make meaning of one’s own self. He originally located the task of identity achievement in the adolescent years as part of a psychosocial framework in which the sociocultural milieu (ethos) is integrated with the biological development of the human being (soma) (1963, 1968, 1997). Bringing identity into a cultural consciousness in the 1960’s, Erikson gave young adults a fruitful paradigm to understand their own frustrations with reconciling their characters/personalities into the social roles offered by their cultures. In essence, he defines identity as a balance between the self and the other - the result of attaching meaning to identifications/relevant labels and integrating them into an internalized and coherent sense of self. However, such a model is not explicitly psychological. Erikson acknowledged that psychological issues surrounding identity are historically relative and a result of an increasingly postmodern culture (1968, 1975). Thus, he labeled his theories as ‘psychosocial’ in that they reflected the functional (and sometimes variable) interaction between society and the person. Since then, Lerner has more precisely described this ‘developmental contextualism’ as a post-positivist perspective in which there is a reciprocal relationship in the person-context variables; in essence, both person and society are developing (1993). Further, we now know that identity achievement is not just a task for adolescence, but is functionally reshaped and reworked throughout the adult lifespan (Cote, 2006; Erikson, 1997; see Snarey & Bell, 2003, for description of functional development). Over the last two decades, clinical and theoretical identity research has been on the rise. In clinical therapy, identity has increasingly become the topic of therapeutic models for treatment in both adolescents and adults. And in what could be called a “discursive explosion,” the psychological search engine, PsychINFO, reveals a dramatic increase in articles dealing with identity (from 775 articles in the 1960’s to 19,000 articles in 1995-2005).

But what is religious identity? It depends on who you ask. The “explosion” in identity research has been plagued by a lack of conceptual clarity as both scholars in the humanities and social sciences use the term ‘identity’ in widely varying models (Cote, 2006). Out of this confusion, the more specific term, ‘religious identity,’ has appeared in hundreds of articles and books, overwhelmingly in work rooted in the humanities. But it has lacked theoretical precision and empirical validation. Ethnographic scholars of religion employ religious identity to describe singular phenomena in small cultural groups, and social statisticians refer to religious identity as merely social capital. These popular uses ignore the psychological aspects of religious identity. Identity itself is partly a neurological and cognitive phenomenon– something that can be lost due to neurological trauma or disease. In this understanding, identity is formed through a cognitive process of selecting long-term memories stored in the temporal lobe and using them as resources for autobiographical memory – operating variably in subconscious and conscious beliefs and behavior. However, identity is also a psychosocial construct, in which an individual uses the surrounding cultural resources to both passively inherit and actively construct a habituated pattern of identity narrative. Among the cultural resources shaping identity narratives are identity domains such as ethnicity, politics, vocation, sexuality, and religion. As a psychological construct, religious identity is operationally defined by the way a person relates her/his understanding of her/his own self to a transcendent being or force and to a sociocultural group predominantly characterized by a transcendent object.

In an individual’s breaking away from family and forming a more independent sense of identity in adolescence, the goal of identity formation is to have a relative continuity of the self over time. However, many individuals struggle with this identity achievement, and Marcia’s (1966) statuses of identity have been quite helpful in understanding this process. In Marcia’s latest revised Identity Status Interview (ISI), a diagnostic measure is given to individuals (either early or late adolescence) and results are tabulated into four identity statuses: identity diffusion, foreclosure, moratorium, and achieved (Marcia et al., 1993). Over the last few decades, there has been difficulty in accounting for longitudinal variability in this measure, and factor analysis has pointed to identity domain differences. In response, researchers have increasingly accepted a ‘postmodern’ self: individuals are constructs of several identities, each of which may have a different identity status of development. For example, one’s ethnic or vocational achieved identity may be out of sync with one’s religious identity development. This can be of critical importance for those offering clinical therapy and spiritual care.

Over the last few years, the growing understanding of identity domains and differing identity statuses has stimulated dozens of research articles per each domain (i.e., ethnic identity, sexual identity, political identity, and vocational identity); yet, only three empirical articles have considered religious identity as a separate and measurable domain of identity (De Hann & Schulenberg, 1997; Fadjukoff, Pulkkinen & Kokko, 2005; Skorikov & Vondracek, 1998). Empirically oriented scholars are still reticent to work with the important field of religion. The first presentation for the possibility of a psychological construct for religious identity (empirically measurable and separable from other identity domains) was given to the American Psychological Association’s Division 36 Conference this Spring (Bell, 2006).

This lack of attention to religious identity is somewhat surprising. Among domains of identity, religious identity seems to be the most unstable in our current sociocultural context of consumerism and pluralism. More than ever, individuals are aware of their own choices and possibilities within a relative marketplace of religious identities. People freely use the term “shopping” to describe their openness to different denominations and local churches. And while levels of church attendance are remaining stable, longevity in local congregations is decreasing. Individuals are drifting through surprisingly dissimilar faith communities as they try on different religious identities. Further, the diverse cultural backgrounds in parts of our society have also led to religious identity instability. When couples from different religious backgrounds marry, individuals often struggle with different worship styles and theologies associated with their spouse– the person’s religious identity is under threat. When college students from a diversity of religious backgrounds encounter the faith traditions of other students, they tend to adapt their religious identities in significant ways. Some form a new religious identity through conversion, while others homogenize and streamline their religious identity with multiple religious groups. From my experiences of teaching the psychology of religion to college students, the domain of religious identity appears to be of great concern and anxiety. “Who am I?” is inextricably related to religious question, “What do I believe?” Despite this instability in religious identity, individuals consistently rank religiosity very high in their own sense of purpose and subjective well-being. In the identity marketplace, religious identity could be the most valuable commodity.

This paper is part of a larger research project aiming to construct a psychological measure of religious identity in order to better understand the formation and functioning of religious identity across the lifespan. It is hoped that the project will benefit researchers in both the social sciences and humanities, as well as pastoral counselors and religious educators. By offering greater precision to the religious identity domain, researchers may better understand the process of identity development, identity domain interaction, and religious development. Further, psychologists of religion may be able to discern a facet of religiosity that has been overlooked and falls outside of the current psychological measures for religiosity. In practice, such a construct could provide pastoral counselors valuable insight into a client’s psyche; likewise, religious educators would be able to use a construct of religious identity to investigate which types of practices and teachings facilitate religious formation.

Marcia’s Identity Status Interview is characterized by a qualitative nature (approximately one-hour in length) with open-ended questions (Marcia et al., 1993). The interview requires blind reviewers to validate status level, and utilizes a demanding coding list. To facilitate research in identity statuses, Adams remodeled the ISI into a 64-item scale with no need for interview coding. The Measure of Ego Identity Status-II (EOMEIS-II) breaks down into Marcia’s four identity statuses and has been validated through comparison with the ISI (Adams, 1999; Adams, Bennion, & Huh, 1989). The EOMEIS-II includes eight items on religion, but only as a component to the overall identity status with little ability to statistically validate different levels of analysis per dimension. The Ego Identity Process Questionnaire (EIPQ, 32 items) (Balistreri, Busch-Rossnagel, and Geisinger, 1995) measures the separate dimensions of commitment and exploration in eight areas: Occupation, Religion, Politics, Values, Family, Friendships, Dating, and Sex Roles. The coadjuted identity domains were not methodologically constructed for separate statistical analysis but extensive validity analysis may support such results. These measures were designed to analyze a ‘global identity’ – a sense of overall identity formation in each individual. But over the last decade, researchers have challenged the notion of just one identity and have moved towards measuring the identity status of different identity domains.

De Hann & Schulenberg (1997) found that political identity formation does not commonly reach an achieved status until the middle-20’s, whereas religious identity was often achieved in the late teens and early 20’s. Further, adolescents in junior high school were typically in foreclosure in the religious identity domain, moving through diffusion in high school, and then moratorium or achieved statuses in college. This is unique among identity domains, since other identity domains typically begin in diffusion and move towards the other three statuses. The typical pattern of religious identity formation moving from foreclosure towards diffusion is complimented by a decline in religious commitment from early to later adolescence (Francis & Pearson, 1987). This generates several questions. Why is the religious identity domain so unique? Is religious identity formation affected by different religious backgrounds, such as Protestant vs. Catholic? Is there an increased anxiety for individuals who are in religious identity moratorium or diffusion? De Hann & Schulenberg’s findings were limited by using the EOMEIS which only asks eight questions in the religious identity domain; thus only two questions are asked per the four identity statuses of religious identity. Further, the authors understood religiosity as fairly uniform and did not break down results for religious backgrounds, even though the sample was nicely divided (49% Protestant; 36% Catholic).

Another recent study included religious identity as a separate domain with Marcia’s four statuses (Fadjukoff, Pulkkinen & Kokko, 2005). Working with Finnish adults, the authors found religious identity to commonly be diffused for men and foreclosed for women even when the individuals were rated as identity achieved overall. The authors concluded that neither political nor religious identity seem to be salient in the overall achievement of identity. However, this also suggests that religious identity may be understood separately from other domains of identity. Two further caveats to this study: 1) as the authors note, Lutheran religion in Finland is not perceived as an important entity in that cultural context. How would North American adults differ in their perception of the importance of religious identity? 2) the research was conducted through a semistructured interview with the open ended question, “Do you have a personal relationship to religion?” This method lacks a theoretical sharpness that a carefully constructed religious identity scale may be able to provide. The only other study that has measured religious identity status independently from overall identity found that religious identity lagged behind vocational identity among adolescents (Skorikov & Vondracek, 1998). This leaves researchers and counselors with a plethora of unanswered questions. How do denominational factors influence religious identity formation? Is religious identity achievement as stable in adulthood as in other identity domains? What is the relationship between ethnic identity and religious identity for first and second generation immigrants in American society?

Most research in identity and religion has looked at identity as an overall unified construct. With approximately a dozen articles published in this area, scholars have most often been interested in how variables of religiosity (such as E, I, & Q measures) interact with an individual’s identity development status (Allport & Ross, 1966; Gorsuch & McPherson, 1989). Intrinsic religiosity has been linked with identity achievement and extrinsic religiosity with identity diffusion (Fulton, 1997). Identity foreclosure has been associated with indiscriminates and extrinsics (Markstrom-Adams & Smith, 1996). Differing from the identity research, many of these research projects find religious orientation to be quite salient in the stages of identity development. Overall, religion has been positively associated with identity achievement but researchers know little of the mechanism or specific interaction in this positive association (King, 2003). King has suggested that religion uniquely provides a rich nexus of ideological, spiritual, and social resources which prove quite helpful in reaching identity achievement. A significant problem with this correlational research is that many identity status scales are confounded by their amount of religious content (Adams et al., 1989; Spilka, Hood, Hunsberger, & Gorsuch, 2003). Thus, when one measures religious variables (such as religious commitment or religious orientation levels) in relation to identity status there is a conceptual duplication since the identity scale itself is composed of similar religious measures. In other words, it would be difficult to not find that increases in religious maturity are related to overall global identity development. Given the domain uniqueness of religious identity and the confounding religious content in identity scales, Spilka et al. (2003) suggest that researchers should construct an independent measure for religious identity.

This paper proposes that the research be reframed, moving from the question of how one’s religiosity influences overall identity to the question of how religious identity is an empirically unique, separate component of identity (qualitatively different per identity statuses) which should be attended to by researchers and pastoral counselors. With the lack of conceptual clarity in scholarly articles, researchers have loosely presumed religious identity to be an easily understood, self-reported labeling of one’s religious affiliation. However, it is much more unique, complex, and significant than has been previously assumed. In the American marketplace of religion, individuals who refer to “shopping” for a religious home or see themselves as spiritual “seekers” are looking for more than a religious label. The postmodern tension between religious homogenization (lowest-common-denominator theology) and religious splintering has resulted in a great deal of angst and internal mistrust for persons seeking a religious identity. As part of a project in developing a Religious Identity Status Scale, these four statuses of religious identity (Table A) are offered as the first step in seeing the complexity of how an individual integrates his/her transcendent sense of a relationship with the sacred and the surrounding religious community into a coherent sense of self.

A 28-item questionnaire has been designed, using the eight previous questions from the EOMEIS-II, and adding twenty more questions (seven per religious identity status), including six with reverse scoring, in order to better get at the complexity and formation of religious identity. Results are being correlated with demographics, religious backgrounds (including denominational differences), and religious practices and beliefs. Construct validity is partly established by consistency among status questions, test-retest variation, and statistical similarity to the previously validated EOMEIS-II questions. The questionnaire is constructed for the internet, and results will be weighted to consider selection biases (those with a computer may be younger, ethnically homogenous, and better educated). The n goal is 1000. In general, as with other identity domains, it is expected that individuals will typically move developmentally from religious identity diffusion (RID) and foreclosure (RIF) towards religious identity moratorium (RIM) and then to religious identity integration (RII) through the adolescent years into early adulthood. However, it is also expected that adults may have situational events and cultural factors than could unravel RIA into RIM at any point in the lifespan, or they may become non-religious and move into a RID status.

It has been assumed that children inherently begin in identity diffusion. They are not interested in defining themselves. RID would describe children and adults who are disinterested in religion, and possibly those who are extrinsically oriented towards their religion (self-serving motivation for religious involvement1) (Griffith & Griggs, 2001). They have made no commitment to a religious community or set of beliefs, nor have they felt any crisis in regards to this lack of commitment.

Here, one of the internal problems with the overall identity status paradigm becomes apparent. Marcia’s conception of identity diffusion status implicitly values a growth beyond this status, moving at least to identity foreclosure or moratorium. If a young adult does not move beyond the identity diffusion status, then they could demonstrate psychopathological symptoms (Kroger, 2004). Further, identity diffusion is correlated with relatively low pre-conventional or conventional levels of moral reasoning (Skoe & Marcia, 1991). Of course, religious identity questions are part of the measure and computation of identity. Yet, one can imagine several scenarios in which religious identity in particular should not be related to low moral development, nor to psychopathology. For example, an individual who is brought up within a religious belief system may deconvert, or simply become non-religious. The fact that some individuals choose to be nonreligious, or to deconvert, is not likely due to a lack of overall identity maturity. In different cultural contexts, religion may not be a predominant resource for identity formation, such as in largely nonreligious societies or even in microcosms of family systems that are largely nonreligious. Marcia’s original identity trajectory functions, in effect, as a sort of religious propagator by favoring those who are religious and confounding identity development with other domains resulting with a fallacious correlation between non-religious people and poor mental health.

This status reflects individuals who have made a commitment to a religious tradition and its set of beliefs and practices. But RIF’s are distinguished from RIA individuals by their lack of flexibility and their strong desire for conformity. Overall foreclosed individuals tend to be authoritarian and need the approval of their peers. They can quickly become defensive about their faith and are correlated with conventional moral reasoning (Kroger, 2004). They are marked by a pattern of accomadation and inherit their religious identity with no critical reflection. As stated above, De Hann & Schulenberg (1997) reviewed findings that showed early adolescents in the RIF status, and then moving into a RID status – opposite of more typical patterns of other identity domains. In highly religious societies, it may be that teenagers have ample opportunities to unquestionably adopt a religious identity for sake of ease and comfort. If we had measures for pre-adolescents, we may find that they move from diffusion earlier than other identity domains, as many adopt a concrete-operational styled religious identity (RIF) by the age of 13. That this is out of sync with other identity domains establishes further evidence that religious identity functions in cognitively unique ways for many individuals. Are religious symbols and belief systems more salient resources for identity commitments at an earlier age than other resources? If so, why has some research pointed to a move from RIF to RID as the teenager gets older? Further, in that some churches encourage critical reflection on their beliefs and others renounce such efforts, we could imagine that denominational backgrounds would be strongly influential in moving masses of people into RIF, or towards RIA.

Individuals characterized by an RIM status do not demonstrate a commitment to a religious tradition, and they may either feel some anxiety about their religious identity, or they may just be reflective and attentive to this identity domain. They have a strong sense of willfulness and self-esteem while resisting demands for conformity. These are the religious seekers, those who are open to different religious identities and score high on the Quest measure of religiosity. Their religious identity is in flux and may stay in this status for weeks or for a lifetime. From clinical experience, these are the individuals who feel greater stress and seek out pastoral counselors and clinical psychologists. In regards to those in overall identity moratorium, individuals report that Marcia’s identity status interview gives them insight into their situation (Kroger, 2004). Such clinical application could be sharpened with a clearer perspective on the individual domain of religious identity, especially for spiritual caregivers and pastoral counselors.

The word integration is used instead of Marcia’s word achievement in order to remove the implicit valuing of different theologies and traditions of religious identity formation. Those who are foreclosed can be quite satisfied with their religious identity; it may serve them and their tradition well. Erikson used the terminology “identity vs. role confusion” to describe this stage in which an individual takes previous identifications (labels) and integrates them into a coherent sense of self. Building on Erikson’s original conceptualization, integration better describes this process in religious identity formation in which a person critically reflects upon his/her culture’s religious belief systems and traditions. They then choose for their own sake, and not just for others, to integrate a particular faith system into who they are and how they define themselves. Having made a commitment to a religious identity, RII individuals have a strong sense of self-esteem and autonomy. However, they also remain flexible, even playful, with religious practices and beliefs.

Overall, religious identity is likely an independent measure that rises or falls in salience and quality per cultural contexts, individual experiences, and developmental growth. The task of this larger project is to construct a scale offering validity for both religious identity status and religious identity salience. This measure for salience (Religious Identity Salience Scale) is a simple measure in which individuals are asked to quickly list the top ten words that describe who they are. The scale is coded for religious content and weight is given to words that are listed at the top of the list and proportionately decreasing towards the end of the list. Secondly, five questions are asked in regards to an individual’s religious commitments and how important they understand religion to be to who they are. Since individuals are unaware that the scale is asking about religion when they first name ten descriptors, then there should be less impression management bias. The second page explicitly asks the person to report how important religion is to their identity. It has been interesting to see large variance in importance between these two pages.

This scale serves two purposes. First, the study is trying to see whose religious identity is more or less important to them. For instance, do Southern Baptist young adults report a higher or lower religious identity salience than do other groups? Do African-Americans from the inner city report higher religious identity salience than suburban and wealthier African-Americans? Do second generation Asian-Americans report higher religious identity salience than first generation immigrants? Correlation with religious beliefs and practices will be evaluated for significance, as will self-reported changes in religious identity salience over the lifespan (I.e., “Is your religious identity more important to you than when you were younger?”). If the goal of a religious educator is to form religiously committed and mature individuals, then it will be interesting to see which practices, beliefs, and backgrounds are significant in such development.

Secondly, the study is a first attempt at measuring for implicit (sub-conscious, no impression management) and explicit (conscious, impression management) aspects of religious identity. ‘Implicit’ comes from the Latin past participle implicare, meaning ‘to entangle.’ If a religious identity is given on the first page (when religion is not prompted), it likely points to an important ‘entangling’ of the domain with other areas of identity and salience for the person – meaning that religious identity more greatly influences how the person understands family, politics, gender, etc. However, some individuals may self-report a strong religious identity when explicitly prompted; yet, their “top ten” list of descriptors may not include any word with religious content.

Asserting that religious identity cognitively functions in implicit and explicit ways is supported by recent work in cognitive science. Using latency based priming and indirect factors, cognitive scientists are finding important difference between expressed beliefs/reasoning styles and the cognitive functioning of the individual (Greenwald, McGhee, & Schwartz, 1998). The problem with much of the research in the psychology of religion is that it has been based on self-reported questionnaires, and any self-report study will be impacted by a social desirability effect. The subject of religion itself is often a very sensitive topic and highly influenced by a person’s impression management, meaning that they may want to underreport or over-report religious identity. Such discrepancies in public presentation of religious identity and the actual functioning of religious identity may be a source of anxiety and stress – an obvious concern to pastoral counselors.

Identity has increasingly become the ‘presenting problem’ in our postmodern era. Pulled between the homogenizing forces of globalization and the variegation of multicultural societies, religious identity has risen to the forefront of identity domains as a source for both a sense of belonging and cultural divisiveness. Further, this is not merely the product of religion as social capital; religious identity, as shown above, functions in cognitively and developmentally unique ways. The ultimate goal of this project is to provide researchers and counselors with a better psychological understanding of religious identity. In clinical practice, the Religious Identity Scale could help determine more specific and informed types of care such as validating religious identity moratorium, prompting delayed individuals into an integrated sense of and search for religious identity, and possibly enabling foreclosed religious identity subjects into an integrated religious identity.

Here are some other examples of how spiritual care and pastoral counseling can be fine-tuned towards the important aspect of religious identity formation. For individuals in religious identity diffusion, there may be points of stress that could present symptoms of poor mental health due to sociocultural location in which a person with a RID status lives in a religiously committed family system, or even due to living in a highly religious culture. When an individual’s religious identity does not fit the family or society’s expectation of commitment, the person may feel marginalized, disconnected, and even damned. Unless the counselor has a proselytizing agenda, the diagnostic scale could help validate a client’s lack of religious interest or their deconversion, affirming their choice and validating their worth despite society’s disapproval. Likewise, religious identity foreclosed individuals may work in a highly secular environment (such as academia) and feel a sense of dissonance as they live in two worlds - one of committed religious identity though conformity in personal life, and another vocational world in a critical reflective environment. Further, some RIF individuals may feel a crisis when they realize that they are performing for someone else’s approval and have the need to break away. The most likely person to seek help is a religious identity moratorium individual. RIMs struggle with what they believe and may move back and forth between RID and RIM. In moratorium, religious beliefs have become personal and are a stressor for identity formation. As with RIDs, the individual may be a misfit with a religious society. This can be seen in some adolescents who begin asking questions or having doubts that they find deeply troubling.

The salience and implicit/explicit aspects of religious identity are also important to caregivers. Previously held religious identities have a way of remaining implicitly and subconsciously present in a person who thought they had long ago moved onto a new identity. In academia, I have come across many individuals who purport to have no religious beliefs or religious identity. Yet, this explicit declaration can be slyly undermined revealing a still important implicit religious identity. For example, I hear these comments after some prompting, “I’m still surprised by how Jewish I am;” or “I still want to go down to the altar when I hear the ‘Just as I am’ hymn.” There is a sticking power in religious identity. The “lapsed Catholics” are still calling themselves Catholic. This is more than just a cognitive resource in case of crisis; it is a residing subconscious aspect for those who formed a religious identity at an early age. This implicit religious identity may be a formative influence in emotional contexts. Thus, explicitly reported salience may not match implicitly reported salience. A person may report a low level of religious identity, and yet, have an important implicit religious identity. For caregivers, this may enact a process of integrating the person’s implicit religious identity with the conscious self, allowing the person to accept this domain of identity.

For research in the psychology of religion, this could reveal a core aspect for how religion functions in the mind. When religious identity is formed at an early age, it may be the foundation for all other aspects of religiosity, such as religious practices and religious beliefs. Individuals may be able to easily change their religious practices (i.e., stop attendeding mass, stop listening to religious radio). They also can change their religious beliefs more easily than they would like to think (seen in longitudinal studies of religious beliefs); but religious identity seems to have a much longer shelf life. In the face of multicultural societies, religious identity may be the primary factor sustaining overall religiosity when an individual encounters conflicting belief systems. As said before, it may be the most important commodity.

Why has religious identity been overlooked by empirical researchers? There is a folk psychology among people, including scholars, who prefer to see themselves as consciously reasoning independent beings who willfully form their own identity. We may see unconscious issues in others, but we are largely blind to our own unconscious influences. Yet, it only takes a high school student to notice that identity is largely constructed not by autonomous choices, but mostly by the surrounding cultural resources, such as in religion. There were not many Islamic folk in my southern hometown; it was not a resource for those in that culture. This locally constructed identity becomes implicit and integral to a person’s beliefs as they develop. We know from cognitive studies in memory how selective the mind is in sifting through external data. Identity provides a powerful ‘sifting’ hermeneutic through which information is perceived and stored. Most of us do not wake up each morning asking ourselves who am I, yet our operating identity may be the primary interpreting principle of who we will be during that day. In the homogenization of cultural identities, religious identity has become a way to find particularity in a globalized world. This project will hopefully spur other research in religious identity, which could point to motivating factors in religious violence per religious identity statuses. But first things first: recognizing these religious identity statuses is crucial to understanding the formation and development of religious identity and overall spiritual development for postmodern individuals.

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1 Although overall identity diffusion is related to extrinsic religiosity, Allport & Ross’s measures of intrinsic and extrinsic religious orientation are problematic in that the measure applies negative value to extrinsic religious motivation. Thus, those more motivated by the liturgical practices and fellowship in a religious community are deemed less religiously mature than those who are more intrinsically motivated by personal belief systems.

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Position on religious identity	Religious identity moratorium	Religious identity foreclosure	Religious identity diffusion	Religious identity integration
Crisis	Present	Absent	Absent	Present
Commitment	Absent	Present	Absent	Present