Description

The Daily Spiritual Experience Scale (DSES) is a psychometric tool developed to measure individuals’ daily spiritual experiences. This scale assesses the frequency and intensity with which people experience spiritual and religious events in their daily lives, such as the feeling of connection with the divine, peace, and gratitude.

Objective

The primary goal of the DSES is to provide a reliable and valid means of measuring daily spiritual experience. This tool helps in understanding how spirituality impacts individuals’ mental and physical health, well-being, and behavior. It is widely used in research to study the relationship between spirituality and various psychological and health outcomes.

Analysis

The DSES consists of 16 items that assess daily spiritual experiences in different aspects. Participants are asked to rate the frequency with which they experience specific spiritual experiences, such as:
A sense of connection with God or the divine.
A sense of peace and harmony.
A sense of gratitude and awe for life.
Experiences of compassion and kindness toward others.
A sense of inner strength and support.

Scoring

The scoring of the DSES is done using Likert scales, where participants rate each item on a scale from 1 (never or almost never) to 6 (very often, several times a day). These responses are collected and analyzed to produce overall scores, with higher scores indicating greater frequency and intensity of spiritual experiences.

Bibliography

Underwood, L. G., & Teresi, J. A. (2002). The Daily Spiritual Experience Scale: Development, theoretical description, reliability, exploratory factor analysis, and preliminary construct validity using health-related data. Annals of Behavioral Medicine, 24(1), 22-33.
Underwood, L. G. (2011). The Daily Spiritual Experience Scale: Overview and results. Religions, 2(1), 29-50.
Idler, E. L., & Kasl, S. V. (1997). Religion among disabled and nondisabled persons II: Attendance at religious services as a predictor of the course of disability. The Journals of Gerontology Series B: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, 52(6), S306-S316.
Koenig, H. G., McCullough, M. E., & Larson, D. B. (2001). Handbook of Religion and Health. Oxford University Press.