Psychological Patterns
5.8 Psychological Patterns .1 Belonging and acceptance
Belonging and acceptance are important psychological themes in the stories.
Some of the participants have struggled with issues of self-esteem and self- worth that arose from their sense of alienation or broken/dysfunctional homes.
They experience the DCC as a new model of home and community where there is care, spiritual teaching, equipping, and a space to share problems and receive encouragement, love and support. After encountering the DCC, participants appear to have found a new family and an improved self-esteem.
For T1, the special significance of the DCC family is that it includes those from other nationalities and as a result the house is truly "a house of prayer for all nations".
5.8.2 Self-esteem and self-actualisation
The participants appear to exhibit a positive self-esteem and attribute this to their relationship with God. The narratives reveal the participants' inclination to see themselves as special people who have tapped into a power source that has the capacity to transform their lives and the lives of others. The participants possess a sense of accomplishment about themselves. They do not doubt their competence and value and are able to identify assets in their lives. Faith is the primary asset in the self-actualisation of the participants. At no point did race, gender or class appear to be a hindrance to their self-esteem. Participants view themselves as people who are making a valuable contribution to the transformation of other people's lives.
5.8.3 Personality types
In an article entitled "Christian belief about the Bible and the Holy Spirit in relation to psychological type", Village (2006:1) discusses the link between psychological types and the expression of Christian faith. Using adaptations of Carl Jung's personality typologies and four personality functions, Extraversion and Introversion, Sensing and Intuition, Thinking and Feeling and Judging and Perceiving, Village (2006:2) recorded the following important findings which relate to charismatic Christians.
Those who prefer sensing (i.e. those who value routine and are comfortable with familiar circumstances and objects and look at specific parts and pieces rather than patterns and relationships) to intuition (people who prefer ideas to facts, thrive on new information and imagine new possibilities) seem more likely to separate the sacred from the secular and believe in traditional Christian doctrine (2006:4). This explanation aptly describes the participants. The spiritual-physical dichotomisation in the thinking of the participants was clearly evident.
In Village's (2006:14) study there is a strong link between belief in healing and the feeling personality function (people who make subjective decisions based on personal values and standards, have a strong sense of empathy and find it easier to assess a situation from within rather than standing apart and taking a more disengaged view). He suggests that this may be due to the following:
Feeling types are more responsive to the empathy involved in praying for healing... Charismatic activities such as speaking in tongues or giving words of prophecy require a certain suspension of rational, logical thought (2006:14).
Village concludes that conservative charismatic Christians are more likely to be sensing and feeling types (2006:15). In the case of the participants, it is my observation that there is a strong leaning towards the feeling personality function.
5.8.4 Resilience/Breakthrough
A common element in the stories is the theme of resilience139, which refers to the "factors that predispose people to have positive outcomes". In the case of young people, resilience is defined by Werner140 as "the ability to cope effectively with stress and to exhibit an unusual degree of psychological strength for ones age and set of circumstances". The stories of the young people capture the type of resilience Werner describes. Though challenges threatened to limit and hinder the participants' ability to rise above their circumstances they were able to break through and witness a positive outcome.
The term "breakthrough" is important to consider at this point since it is common in Pentecostal/Charismatic circles. I believe that it is a more forceful form of the word "resilience". It is used to describe a positive outcome or release from an uncomfortable, oppressive situation that burdens a person emotionally, physically, socially or financially. The imagery that emerges from the term breakthrough is generally a picture of a person pushing through a restraining barrier and victoriously emerging on the other side. The congregants are often told to pray for a breakthrough. Such prayer is normally accompanied by speaking in tongues and positive affirmations. The testimonies reveal a resilience, which the participants attribute to their faith and the DCC community.
Thus in the case of the participants, faith, and their church, are key factors which predispose them to experience positive outcomes.
139According to the Commission on Urban Life and Faith, (Rees, Francis and Robbins 2006:3).
http://www.childrenssocietv.orq.uk/NR/rdonlyres/FEC1656E-7D65-4C2C-A6AF- 423E8AEE609C/0/SpiritualhealthandwellbeinqCE.pdf
140(xxx:31)
5.8.5 The attachment theory
The participants made explicit reference to their trust in, dependence on and closeness with God. A useful theory for the understanding of adult closeness to God is called the attachment theory. It is useful to discuss this theory in order to attempt to understand the close, dependent relationship of the participants with God from a psychological viewpoint. The attachment theory is a psychological theory of personality and social development that was developed by Bowlby (in Kirkpatrick 1997:207). According to Bowlby an attachment system exists in humans and other primates. This system is necessary in order to provide protection from danger, and is described as follows,
When the infant is alarmed or distressed, the attachment system is activated and the infant engages in behaviours that function to re- establish proximity to the caregiver or attachment figure. In the absence of danger or distress, awareness of the caregiver's potential availability produces a secure base from which to engage in confident exploration of the environment (Bowlby in Kirkpatrick 1997:208)
This theory initially focused on infant and child development in order to understand infants' attachments and bonds to parents/caregivers and to determine the impact of the type of attachment style on development. Recently, the theory has been extended to the understanding of adult attachments to lovers and adult romantic love. In his paper titled "A longitudinal study of changes in religious belief and behaviour as a function of individual differences in adult attachment style", Kirkpatrick (1997:207) further extends the said theory so as to study adult attachment in religious experience and belief. He lists three attachment styles found in infants, which have implications for the attachment behaviour of adults.
Secure infants learn effectively to use the attachment figure as a "haven of safety and secure base" (1997:208). They trust that their attachment figures are reliable and responsive when needed, while insecure-avoidant infants appear not to make use of the attachment figure for safety or security concerns and
have learnt that their attempts at proximity are likely to be ignored. Insecure- anxious (or resistant) infants exhibit a high preoccupation with the whereabouts of their attachment figure and display indecisive behaviour towards her/him since they discover that their attachment figures respond to their need for closeness and comfort in unreliable, inconsistent ways. According to Kirkpatrick,
"in the absence of major changes in life circumstances these individual differences are thought to remain fairly stable across childhood and presumably provide a basis upon which adult relationships eventually are founded"
(1997:208); he also argues that attachment theory offers what he calls a
"powerful framework for the psychology of religion" (1997:209).
In examining the relationship between childhood attachment styles and religious variables such as "finding a new relationship with God, having a religious experience or conversion, being born again and speaking in tongues"
(1997:210,) Kirkpatrick's analysis supported compensation, rather than a correspondence hypothesis141. This means that people who reported having avoidant attachments in their childhood appear to be more religious in some ways, as adults, than those who reported that they were secure or anxious as children. This implies that God served as a compensation or substitute attachment figure for those who did not experience security in their childhood.
This finding relates to some of the testimonies where the participants recounted feelings of alienation in their childhood. During the course of interactions with some participants it became apparent that God was seen as a grand caregiver and protector that they could trust. For some, the discovery of a reliable attachment figure in the form of God took place only in adulthood, after experiencing disappointment in this area during infancy and childhood. A relationship with a personal, receptive and approachable God may become a substitute for the absence or insufficiency of responsive attachment figures. In the case of certain participants, Kirkpatrick's theory would be appropriate.
Participants who came from broken, troubled and dysfunctional homes have found all they have needed in God. Another finding from a study conducted in
141 Kirkpatrick and Shaver (1990) in Kirkpatrick (1997).
1992, which stands in contrast to the above, is that adult attachment styles to God mirror childhood attachment styles to caregivers. Secure participants described God as more loving and less distant. Avoidant participants were likely to describe themselves as agnostic. Both of the findings above, though offering different positions are, according to Kirkpatrick, consistent with different aspects of the attachment theory (1997: 209).