Obsessional beliefs, religious beliefs, and scrupulosity among fundamental Protestant Christians

While there has been substantial speculation about the relationship between scrupulosity-and religion in the literature, few studies have directly examined this topic in non-clinical religious communities. The purpose of the present study is to examine obsessional beliefs, scrupulosity, and religious beliefs in a relatively large, homogeneous sample of fundamental Protestant Christians. In addition, this study included validated measures of religious commitment, level of religious fundamentalism, and degree of spiritual well-being. Results support the hypotheses that scrupulosity would be positively correlated with obsessional beliefs and negatively correlated with religious commitment and spiritual well-being. However, contrary to expectations, religious fundamentalism was not significantly related to scrupulosity. Implications of the findings are discussed. (C) 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.