Determinants of Sense of Community in Congregations

Background: Belonging and feeling strong sense of community were proved to contribute to people’s well-being and life satisfaction. This study examined the contribution of personal (i.e., self-esteem), social (i.e., number of congregational friends, societal conditional regard, and motivation to lead) and psychological (feeling of loneliness) aspects to the sense of community among congregational members. A novel aspect of the current study was the examination of a newly developed concept termed societal conditional regard (SCR), i.e., when society gives or withholds love and acceptance on the basis of the individual's compliance with social norms and can be divided into two kinds of regard:  positive (SCPR) and negative (SCNR) regard. Very few studies focused on the contributing factors explaining different levels of sense of community among congregational members, thus, this exploration is warranted.

Method:  Participants consisted of 260 active members of synagogues in Israel from the National Religious sector, known in the US as modern Orthodox Jews. They were between the ages of 18 and 88 years old (Mean = 32.91, SD = 11.46), 40% of them were males and 60% were females.  Most of them were married or in a committed relationship (67.3%), with the remainder single (32.7%). Following the approval of the BIU's Institutional Review Board, recruitment took place through the Internet (e.g., Facebook, e-mail, and chatrooms), and through mobile applications (e.g. WhatsApp).  Willing participants answered via Google Docs.    

Results: Structural equation modeling indicated that the social resources made the most significant contribution to sense of community. A significant direct positive contribution of number of congregational friends and SCPR to sense of community was found. However, SCNR made the highest negative direct contribution to sense of community, while the motivation to lead made no contribution to sense of community. Self-esteem made only indirect positive contribution to sense of community via loneliness, while loneliness made a direct negative contribution to sense of community.   

Implications: The fact that sense of community was positively correlated with SCPR suggests that people’s feelings of belonging is not only the expression of trust and security, but rather how their behavior conform with expectations of others. The more one feels that acceptance is based on behavior in accordance with the group’s norms the more the person feels an insider even though the acceptance is conditional. As such, in the context of congregation, people react to SCPR not as a personal unwanted control but as part of membership.

Community social workers who work with religious communities could therefore take the present study's findings into consideration. The understanding that the social aspects has the most significant impact on the individual's sense of community could be the basis for promoting intervention programs seeing the congregation as target for intervention, emphasizing a decrease in SCNR, and reinforcing those aspects of SCPR that contribute to the sense of community.