Abstract This study reports the psychometric properties of Iranian Religious Coping Scale, considering the Iranian social and cultural context. Study 1: Through an interview with 50 college students, preliminary qualitative information was obtained about the coping strategies they use when faced with a severe stressful event. After this initial information was content analyzed, the items obtained along with the Standard Coping Responses Inventory and a revised version of the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale were administered to a new sample of students (N=365). Results from exploratory factor analysis yielded seven pure factors. Religious coping was obtained as an independent dimension of coping among Iranians. In Study 2 (N=176), evidence for the discriminative and convergent validity of the newly developed Religious Coping Scale was demonstrated. It is suggested that future research should consider the possible contamination of religious constructs with social desirability. Based on the results of the present research, it is concluded that the Religious Coping Scale has enough validity and reliability for use in research studies.

Keywords: religious coping, psychometry, cross-cultural validation

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