Intrinsic religious orientation and religious rewards: An empirical evaluation of two approaches to religious motivation

Gordon Allport defined intrinsic religious orientation as the polar opposite of the utilitarian and instrumental extrinsic orientation. On the other hand, Rodney Stark and associates developed a theory of religion according to which the utilitarian motive is at the very core of (any) religious motivation. A study of undergraduate students from three social settings with different dominant religions (Catholic, Islamic and Eastern Orthodox) showed that the intrinsic religious orientation and the perceived religious rewards, such as expectations of eternal life in heaven or perceptions of God’s help in everyday life, tend to form a unidimensional construct in all the observed samples. On the one hand, these results shed new light on the assumption of intrinsic religious orientation being free of utilitarian and instrumental motives. On the other hand, they lend substantial support to the basic assumption of the rational choice approach to religion.