Methodological Issues in the Psychology of Religion: Toward Another Paradigm?

Recent evaluations have identified the psychology of religion as a field in crisis and have called for a new multilevel interdisciplinary paradigm. However, a critical meta-perspective on methods reveals a broad range of methodologies, each appropriate for particular levels of complexity in the psychology of religion. No single methodology is appropriate for every level, nor can higher levels of complexity be explained by data from lower levels. The authors identify the different types of research practiced in the psychol­ogy of religion and critically discuss philosophical presuppositions involved in two major methodological traditions, the empiricist-analytical and the hermeneutical, often identi­fied as quantitative and qualitative traditions, respectively.