Abstract
Ninety-one Christian and 100 public school eighth graders were given three instruments to assess their religious values. These paper and pencil tests were, respectively, the semantic differential for the terms God and Prayer, Allport's “Intrinsic-Extrinsic” Religious Orientation Scale and Rokeach's “Instrumental Values” scale. Statistically significant differences were observed between the two groups for all three measures. Specifically, Christian school students had greater positive orientations to the concepts God and Prayer, more intrinsic religious orientations, and a greater preference for moral (interpersonal) behaviors than did their public school counterparts. The results were discussed in terms of an integration of the findings, problems associated with generalizing from self-report date to actual overt behavior, and with respect to potential research possibilities.
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