Perceptions of the Humanness of Religious Leaders Among University Students

This exploratory study investigated perceptions of the humanness of religious leaders among university students (N = 374). Most respondents perceived that religious leaders were likeable, beneficial to the community, and experienced similar shortcomings to other persons.Items were factor analyzed to confirm variable groupings (KMO measure of sampling adequacy =.770). Twenty-four items were retained to form eight variables with eigenvalues above 1.0 and accounting for 59.285 of the cumulative variance. One variable was identified as the predicted (dependent) variable, i.e., the humanness of religious leaders. Seven other variables (distrust of religious leaders, the likeability of nonreligious professionals, equality of religious leaders, personal experience with religious leaders, boundaries and religious leaders, confidentiality and religious leaders, and public scrutiny of religious leaders) were identified as possible predictor variables. In exploratory analysis, these variables along with demographic variables (i.e., age, religious/spiritual identification, gender, academic status, ethnicity/race, attendance at religious/spiritual events) were analyzed in a linear regression model. The final regression model (Adjusted R ² =.338) included significant contributions from the predictor variables of distrust of religious leaders, the likeability of nonreligious professionals, equality of religious leaders, personal experience with religious leaders, public scrutiny of religious leaders, and attendance at religious/spiritual events. The predictor variable academic status (p =.093) was retained in the final model because of its proximity to significance and to minimize the risk of committing a Type II error. Implications of these findings are discussed.