RESEARCH METHODS AND RESOURCES

The research for this project is both quantitative, grounded in two sociological surveys, and qualitative, grounded in extensive interviewing and participant observation in each church.

While we seek to comprehensively understand megachurch ministries, we will contextualize this information into the history of global south Christianity more generally, analyze the role of modernization on megachurch development, and discover various ways in which megachurches in the Global South relate to emergent secularization.

Quantitative Research Consists of Two Surveys:

Leadership: The first survey, developed and administered using Qualtrics software, will be administered to church leaders and staff by Regional Teams in order to determine basic ideas about church size, leadership structure, organizational style, information about various ministries, worship styles, theological perspectives, and how media is employed in the church.

Congregants: This survey, which will be administered using different modes as appropriate in each church, also utilizes Qualtrics Software and will be organized around four themes:

  1. Social, economic, educational, and political profile of respondent.

  2. Belief and practices of respondent

  3. Social, cultural, and political attitudes of respondent.

  4. Reasons for megachurch attendance and commitment.

Within these four categories our survey will ask congregants questions about their social, economic, and educational backgrounds; spiritual beliefs, practices, and moral values; spiritual journeys and different churches attended; the role of such things as internet, social media, and television in the life of the respondent; their reasons for attending a particular megachurch, what sorts of internal ministries and support their megachurch provides; and beliefs about Christian social and political engagement.

While our survey instruments are unique to this study, in preparing questions our project leaders have consulted other well-known survey templates with questions on similar subjects, such as the World Values Surveys, the International Gallup Polls, Pew Research Center: Religion and Public Life, The Hartford Seminary Megachurch Project, The Baylor Religion Survey https://www.thearda.com/Archive/NatBaylor.asp, The Survey of Church Going Protestants in Singapore (not yet published), and Survey Data for Nine Salvadoran Spirit-filled Churches (cf. Appendix to Wadkins, The Rise of Pentecostalism in El Salvador (Baylor, 2017). The Megachurch Project’s survey questions and results will be posted to this website as well as to the Association of Religion Data Archives.

Qualitative Research:

In this project our researchers will be participant observers in their respective churches. They will also conduct extensive interviews with a representative sampling of congregants. Interviews will be conducted with leaders, individual congregants, and focus groups within each church. While numbers of interviews will vary church to church, at least 40 will be conducted in each church. These interviews will typically last for 40-60 minutes, will be audio-taped, and will explore such things as social and economic background, faith and practice, congregational life, and attitudes toward the world among congregants and leaders in megachurches. Upon completion of this project all audio-taped interviews will be made publicly available through the Association of Religion Data Archive, and selected interviews and videos will be uploaded to our website. Every interviewee will sign a permission form for us to audio-record the interview.

Research Methods Resources:

Our project leader for Brazil, Sociologist Andrew Johnson, has co-authored the e-book, Studying Faith: Qualitative Methodologies for Studying Religious Communities.

See also Michael Stausberg, Steven Engler, eds. The Routledge Handbook of Research Methods in the Study of Religion (New York, Routledge, 2011)

The video below is from Nick Street, Senior Writer for University of Southern California, Center for the Study of Religion and Civic Culture, and is based on project leader Timothy Wadkins’ research and interviewing within Salvadoran Megachurches.