The Effects of Spiritual/Religious Engagement on College Students' Affective Outcomes: Differences by Gender and Race

This study examines the general and differential effects of spiritual/religious engagement on affective college outcomes (i.e., leadership skills, interpersonal skills, social satisfaction, sense of belonging, and psychological well-being) across different gender and racial groups among undergraduate students at research universities. The study utilized data on 63,528 students who participated in the 2008 University of California Undergraduate Experience Survey (UCUES). The findings reveal differential effects of spiritual/religious engagement on college students' affective outcomes depending on their gender and race (i.e., gender- and race-based conditional effects). Implications for college students' spiritual development at public research universities and faith-based institutions are discussed.     

Reconstructing Judgment: Emotion and Moral Judgment

A traditional association of judgment with “reason” has drawn upon and reinforced an opposition between reason and emotion. This, in turn, has led to a restricted view of the nature of moral judgment and of the subject as moral agent. The alternative, I suggest, is to abandon the traditional categories and to develop a new theory of judgment. I argue that the theory of judgment developed by Justus Buchler constitutes a robust alternative which does not prejudice the case against emotion. Drawing on this theory I then develop how to conceptualize the ways in which feeling and emotion can be (or be components of) moral judgments.     

The BRIEFER Project: Using Expert Systems as Theory Construction Tools

This article describes the development of BRIEFER I and BRIEFER II, expert systems that advise the therapist on selecting, designing, and developing an intervention at the end of the first therapy session. The process of developing expert systems has aided us in describing what brief therapists do, in modeling the intervention design process, and in training brief therapists.     

Women and Religion: The Transformation of Leadership Roles

This paper explores women's leadership roles in the sociology of religion. I focus on the women presidents of three social science research organizations that specialize in the study of religious phenomena: the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, the Association for the Sociology of Religion, and the Religious Research Association, and make some comparisons with women presidents of the American Sociological Association. This paper draws on the work of Marie Augusta Neal for a sociological perspective on women and religion. It suggests policy implications for women and other marginalized groups, and concludes with personal reflections on the transformation process.