Church service roles and anticipated support among older Mexican Americans.

HISPANIC Americans; ATTITUDE (Psychology); CHI-squared test; CHURCH buildings; CONCEPTUAL structures; GROUP identity; INTERVIEWING; PSYCHOLOGY & religion; QUESTIONNAIRES; SOCIAL role; QUALITATIVE research; LABELING theory; SOCIAL support; STRUCTURAL equation modeling; DESCRIPTIVE statistics

MEXICO; UNITED States

The purpose of this study is to see how feelings of anticipated support arise in church. Anticipated support refers to the belief that coreligionists will provide assistance in the future if the need arises. This model contains the following hypothesis: (1) people who affiliate with conservative Protestant congregations will be more deeply committed to their faith, (2) individuals who are more committed to their faith will attend church more frequently, (3) people who go to church more often will be more likely to occupy church service roles, (4) those who occupy church service roles will feel more highly valued by their coreligionists, (5) individuals who feel they are valued highly by fellow church members will receive more emotional support from them, and (6) people who receive more emotional support at church will have stronger anticipated support beliefs. Data from a nationwide survey of older Mexican Americans support these hypotheses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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