Religiosity, Cultural Values, and Attitudes Toward Seeking Psychological Services in Turkey

Most research with Muslim populations has been conducted with samples of immigrants living in the West as minority populations. This study investigates how the culture-related variables of family values and self-construal relate to religiosity and attitudes toward psychological services among Muslims living in Turkey, a country where over 99% of the population identifies as Muslim. To examine how these cultural variables may relate to attitudes toward psychological services, Muslim Turks completed a survey which included measures of religiosity, hierarchical and harmonious family values, cultural self-construal, and attitudes toward psychological services. Religiosity was associated with negative attitudes toward psychological services. The relationship between religiosity and attitudes toward psychological services was fully mediated by hierarchical family values such that when the variable hierarchical family values was added to the model, the relation between religiosity and attitudes toward psychological services was no longer significant. The mediation of hierarchical family values on the relation between religiosity and attitudes toward psychological services was moderated by independent self-construal, so that independent self-construal weakened the mediation while interdependent self-construal had no effect. The results of this study indicate that among Muslim Turks, the relation between religiosity and attitudes toward psychological services is more fully explained when culture-related variables are considered.