The Attachment to God Inventory (AGI; Beck & MacDonald, 2004): An Italian adaptation

Introduction: The first author to postulate a relation between attachment theory and religiousness was Kirkpatrick (1997, 1998, 1999; Kirkpatrick & Shaver, 1990, 1992). Kirkpatrick associates the characteristics of the child-caregiver relationship with the relation between believers and God, who thus transfer attachment from early relationships to the figure of God. In particular, according to Kirkpatrick, just as in traditional attachment relationships, believers seek protection and refuge and to maintain contact with their God. The divinity is considered to be a secure base if the believer perceives to be separated from their god. The first self-report measure of Attachment to God was developed by Kirkpatrick and Shaver (1992) which was based on types of attachment to caregivers. Subsequently, on the basis of this first questionnaire, Beck and MacDonald (2004) created the Attachment to God Inventory (AGI;). These latter authors first created a 70-item questionnaire which was subsequently reduced to 28. Of these items, 14 measure an avoidance of intimacy scale and the remaining items an anxiety of being abandoned scale. Aim: To create an Italian adaptation of the AGI questionnaire. Method: The questionnaire was translated by the authors according to standard procedure (back-translation etc.). The questionnaire was then administered to over 600 participants, including Catholics, atheists and those who declare to believe in ‘other religions’. Kirkpatrick and Shaver’s (1992) questionnaire and scales on religiousness and adult attachment were also administered. Results: Data analysis included factor analysis (confirmatory and explorative), and an analysis of internal coherence. The Anxiety scale is similar to the original one with the exception of one item and reached an alpha value of 0.86; the Avoidance scale,does not include 4 items of which two could also be omitted in the original scale, and two were incoherent in our sample. The final 10-item version of the Avoidance scale reached an alpha value of 0.88. The Italian adaptation thus seems to have a good validity. Further data analysis will examine the relationship between attachment to God, religiousness and adult attachment.