| A descriptive exploration of the links between church participation, civic participation, community collective efficacy (CCE) and church collective efficacy (ChurchCE) was carried out using a cross-sectional mixed method research design grounded in the attitudes, views and needs of church attendee (churchgoers) in four urban, predominantly African American communities characterized by concentrated disadvantage. Using what Creswell (2003) refers to as a sequential transformative research approach, participatory methods were used to guide the development of eight open-ended survey questions, as well as participant review of the forced-choice items. The forced-choice and open-ended questions were combined to form one survey instrument, which was group administered via face-to-face interview to 368 participants selected from 10 churches in four Chicago communities.;Overall, the more churchgoers engaged in religious activity, the more they participated in civic activities, the greater their perceptions of CCE, and the greater their perceptions of ChurchCE. Study findings showed that religious and communal cooperative activities were weak, but promising predictors of CCE and ChurchCE. Further, churchgoer reported resident use of church ministries and programming as evidence that the church was having a positive impact on the surrounding community. |
