Abstract

Among the different ways of coping with stress, religious coping has shown particularly the promising results; nonetheless, there are few validated instruments to assess it in non-English language. This article presents the psychometric properties of the Brief Religious Coping Scale (Brief-RCOPE) in Chilean adults exposed to stressful events. The scale shows a reliability, test-retest stability, and confirmatory factor analysis support structural validity. The scale also shows concurrent validity with another measure of religious coping. Finally, confirming predictive criterion validity, negative religious coping predicts posttraumatic stress symptoms 6 months after, but not posttraumatic growth. Positive religious coping was associated with posttraumatic growth enhancement. This study shows Brief-RCOPE as a valid and reliable instrument for measuring religious coping in this population.