M E L Hall

Biographic Data

ID66865
NAMEM E L Hall
GIVEN NAMESM E L
FAMILY NAMEHall
SIGNATUREHALL M E L
AFFILIATIONSBiola University
ORCID0000-0002-6342-4340
VERIFIEDYes
TOTAL WORKS76
TOTAL CITATIONS84
AUTHOR COUNT76
EDITOR COUNT0
FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR1996
LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR2026
H-INDEX4

  • Honest to God: A Qualitative Study of Engaging with God in Lament

    Open AccessSarah Lawson, M E L Hall et al.ARTICLEJournal of Psychology and Theology2026

    Lament is an ancient form of prayer that has been neglected in American Christianity. Biblical lament—seen throughout scripture and particularly in the psalms—typically follows a pattern: the sufferer addresses God, brings an honest complaint to God, makes a request of God, reminds themself of God’s past work on their behalf, and ends in expressions of confidence in God in a posture of active, willing surrender. After participating in a four-week…

  • In search of biblical masculinity: Exploring masculinities among married White Evangelical complementarian church leaders

    Matthew B Duff, Christina Lee Kim et al.ARTICLEPsychology of Men & Masculinity2026

  • The development of the Christian Views of Suffering Scale

    Nicole Chang, M E L Hall et al.ARTICLEPsychology of Religion and…2026

  • Lament: Measuring a Christian Meaning-Making Coping Practice

    Open AccessM E L Hall, Kelly M Kapic et al.ARTICLEJournal of Psychology and Theology2025

    Research demonstrates that people draw on their religions in coping with difficult life circumstances, and that more religious people tend to cope better than less religious people. Lament is a religious prayer practice that constitutes a form of meaning-making coping. Here, we explicate this form of coping and, in a series of three studies with Christian participants, report on the development of a lament scale. In the first study, we develop it…

  • Handle With Care: The Effects of Benevolent Sexism on Christian Cross-Sex Friendships

    Open AccessWadzie Chikungwa, M E L Hall et al.ARTICLEJournal of Psychology and Theology2025

    The purpose of this study was to explore the effects of benevolent sexism on cross-sex friendships among evangelical Christians. This study consisted of 13 male and 13 female participants, with ages ranging from 25 to 59 ( M = 35.77, SD = 10.86). We analyzed interviews using grounded theory methodology. Results indicated that Christians hold gender-based assumptions that are consistent with benevolent sexism. These benevolently sexist assumptions…

  • When Does Identifying With Christ’s Suffering Help? A Moderated Moderation Analysis

    Open AccessSammi Lee, M E L Hall et al.ARTICLEJournal of Psychology and Theology2025

    While religious coping has been extensively linked with positive outcomes, many emic religious coping resources have been insufficiently explored from a psychological perspective. This study investigated the efficacy of a Christian meaning-making coping method, identification with Christ’s suffering, in ameliorating the negative relation between stressor severity and well-being (i.e., anxiety, depression, life satisfaction) in an international sa…

  • When suffering contradicts belief: Measuring theodical struggling

    Open AccessCrystal L Park, Eric J Silverman et al.ARTICLECurrent Psychology2024

  • Religious affiliation moderates associations between theodicies and mental health in people experiencing significant suffering from bereavement, illness and other stressors

    Crystal L Park, M E L Hall et al.ARTICLEMental Health Religion & Culture2024

    Theodicies have been associated with mental health in several studies. However, little research on theodicies has been conducted with people in the midst of significant suffering. Further, religious traditions differ in theodical content and function in easing suffering. We examined associations between theodicies and mental health in people facing significant suffering and the extent to which they are influenced by Christian religious affiliatio…

  • Spiritual Surrender: Initial Appraisals of Cancer Diagnoses in Black Christian Women

    Open AccessM E L Hall, Grace E Lee et al.ARTICLEJournal of Black Psychology2024References: 33

    The basis of the meaning-making model is that distress results from discrepancies between one's global meaning system and one's situational appraisals of negative life events. This model suggests a preventative function for religion when religious global beliefs inform situational appraisals in ways that minimize distress. Using consensual qualitative research, we evaluated the initial reactions to a cancer diagnosis of 29 Black Christian women. …

  • The lived religion of grace: Exploring diverse Christian narratives

    M E L Hall, Mark R McMinnARTICLEPsychology of Religion and…2023

  • An Undeserved Gift from God: Conservative Christian Experiences of Divine Grace

    Open AccessLindsay M Snow, M E L Hall et al.ARTICLEJournal of Psychology and Theology2023

    The reception of God’s grace is a salient spiritual experience and is one that lies at the heart of Christianity. The present study sought to address a gap in the psychological literature pertaining to the experience of divine grace among Protestant Christians in a qualitative study with 30 adult self-identified Protestant Christians. By using Strauss and Corbin’s grounded theory data analysis, themes emerged to reveal how these Christians concei…

  • Purity Culture: Measurement and Relationship to Domestic Violence Myth Acceptance

    Open AccessAmanda M Ortiz, Bretlyn C Owens et al.ARTICLEJournal of Psychology and Theology2023

    Though discussed extensively in popular culture, purity culture, a conservative Christian movement that builds on traditional sexual ethics by proscribing additional rules and regulations to govern sexual behaviors and prioritize virginity, has scarcely been examined from a psychological perspective. The present study was designed to develop and validate a measure of purity culture, the Purity Culture Beliefs Scale (PCBS). We explore and confirm …

  • Growing in grace: How the experience of divine grace cultivates humility

    Lindsay M Snow, M E L Hall et al.ARTICLEMental Health Religion & Culture2023

    The perception that one is a recipient of divine grace is a salient spiritual experience and is one that lies at the heart of Christianity. This qualitative study sought to address a gap in the psychological literature regarding how the perceived experience of divine grace enacts internal change. For the sake of this study, grace was defined as God’s undeserved gifts to believers. Thirty adult, self-identified evangelical Christians were intervie…

  • Moving from is to ought: The relation between primals and moral foundations

    Melànie B Siems, M E L Hall et al.ARTICLEMental Health Religion & Culture2023

    Primal world beliefs theoretically operate outside of conscious awareness, influencing perception, appraisals of stimuli, and behaviours. Moral foundations theory proposes that intuitions are the primary determinants of moral decisions. Existing research suggests an important role for religiosity in influencing morality. In this online study of 271 Christians, we hypothesised the primals would predict moral foundations above and beyond the varian…

  • God wastes nothing: A consensual qualitative study of coping among Catholic individuals with cancer diagnoses

    Open AccessLaura Shannonhouse, Jorge López et al.ARTICLEJournal of Health Psychology2023Cited by: 2References: 30

    While religious meaning-making has been extensively studied, emic religious coping remains largely unexplored. This consensual qualitative research study explored Catholic cancer survivors' ( N = 22) descriptions of drawing on their religious framework throughout their cancer journeys. Findings revealed distinctive Catholic resources such as the power of blessings, drawing comfort from the saints and sacraments, and "offering up" suffering as a f…

  • Suffering with Christ: Emic christian coping and relation to well-being

    Open AccessM E L Hall, Jason Mcmartin et al.ARTICLESSM - Mental Health2022

    Current measures of religious coping are generally etic in nature, measuring constructs across religions. Emic variables (i.e., those specific to particular religions) are often left out, which limits our ability to assess religious/spiritual coping during times of stress and adversity. Here we provide findings from three studies we conducted to develop and test an emic Christian meaning-making coping method: identifying with Christ in his suffer…

  • Gender Role Ideologies, Marital Satisfaction, and Eudaimonic Well-Being in Evangelical Women

    Open AccessKerry E Horrell, M E L Hall et al.ARTICLEJournal of Psychology and Theology2022

    Recent research has demonstrated that egalitarian gender role ideologies are associated with higher marital satisfaction and higher psychological well-being. However, there has been little research investigating whether gender role ideologies in Evangelical populations follow these same trends. The current study examined how gender role ideologies in an Evangelical population are related to marital satisfaction and eudaimonic well-being, as well …

  • Marital Status at First Intercourse in Married Christian Women: Relationships with Guilt, Sanctification of Sexuality, and Marital Satisfaction

    Open AccessAmanda Ortiz, Amanda M Ortiz et al.ARTICLEJournal of Psychology and Theology2022

    Previous research has demonstrated that women experience higher levels of guilt compared with men at first sexual intercourse. Research also indicates that guilt is related to religiosity and to level of relational commitment. However, there has been no research on the correlates of sexual debut in a Christian population. This study compares the experiences of married Christian women who had first intercourse before or after marriage on guilt, sa…

  • “All the Different Pieces of Me Being Integrated”: Religion/Spirituality and Identity in Working Christian Mothers

    Open AccessElizabeth K Laney, Lisa Carruthers et al.ARTICLEJournal of Psychology and Theology2022

    The current qualitative study explored experiences of religion/spirituality and their impact on women’s identities among Christian working mothers in academia. Thirty semi-structured interviews were conducted and the data analyzed using the grounded theory method. The resultant themes reflected the roles and functions of religion/spirituality in women’s lives and in their identities, primarily by establishing a core sense of self that unified all…

  • Attachment to God and Quest as Moderators of the Relationship between Religious Doubt and Mental Health

    Open AccessNoah S Love, Cassidy A Merlo et al.ARTICLEJournal of Psychology and Theology2022

    The present study examined attachment to God and quest as potential moderators of the relationship between religious doubt and mental health. A sample of Christian participants ( N = 235) completed a survey which included measures of attachment to God, quest, religious doubt, and mental health. As hypothesized, attachment to God and quest significantly moderated an individual’s experience of religious doubt. Low avoidant attachment to God (i.e., …

  • Christian functional views of suffering: A review and theoretical overview

    Jason Mcmartin, M E L HallARTICLEMental Health Religion & Culture2022

    We argue that advancing our understanding of religious meaning-making in the face of trauma and suffering requires greater attention to the specific meanings of suffering that religions offer, and offer an overview of eight functional Christian views of suffering. The beliefs people hold about the traumas they experience lead to differing forms of engagement with their suffering. We first situate religious meanings of suffering in the psychologic…

  • Re-imagining Integration: Student and Faculty Perspectives on Integration Training at Christian Doctoral Programs

    Open AccessMegan Anna Neff, Mary A Peterson et al.ARTICLEJournal of Psychology and Theology2021

    Several explicitly Christian doctoral psychology programs exist in the United States, providing training in the integration of psychology and Christianity. The purpose of this study was to conduct a program evaluation of student and faculty perspectives on the Christian integration training in six explicitly Christian doctoral psychology programs. A total of 299 students and 51 faculty completed the Daily Spiritual Experiences Scale and a questio…

  • The Relationship between Purity Culture and Rape Myth Acceptance

    Open AccessBretlyn C Owens, M E L Hall et al.ARTICLEJournal of Psychology and Theology2021

    The current study investigated the relationship between purity culture, rape myth acceptance, and intrinsic religiosity in the Christian population. Specifically, this study explored if purity culture endorsement would be associated with increased rape myth acceptance and increased likelihood of incorrectly labeling rape. It was also examined whether intrinsic religiosity would ameliorate the relationship between purity culture and rape myth acce…

  • The Christian Sanctification of Suffering Scale: Measure development and relationship to well-being

    M E L Hall, Jason Mcmartin et al.ARTICLEMental Health Religion & Culture2021

    Sanctification theory proposes that when people appraise an aspect of life as having divine character and significance, this can lead to a number of positive outcomes. While questions remain as to whether a negative aspect of life – suffering – can be sanctified, the Christian tradition supports a sanctification approach. In a series of three online cross-sectional studies with Christian participants, we report on the development of a Christian s…

  • Trust in God: An evaluative review of the literature and research proposal

    Joshua N Hook, Daryl R Van Tongeren et al.ARTICLEMental Health Religion & Culture2021

    Until recently, psychologists have conceptualised and studied trust in God (TIG) largely in isolation from contemporary work in theology, philosophy, history, and biblical studies that has examined the topic with increasing clarity. In this article, we first review the primary ways that psychologists have conceptualised and measured TIG. Then, we draw on conceptualizations of TIG outside the psychology of religion to provide a conceptual map for …