Spiritual Monachopsis: Conceptualization, Scale Development, and Psychometric Analysis

In the modern era, individuals have increasingly experienced alienation from their religious environments and have been marked by a profound sense of “homelessness” within their worlds of faith. Based on the concept of “Monachopsis” —the subtle but persistent feeling of being out of place— this study was designed to develop the “Spiritual Monachopsis Scale” (SMS) to measure the spiritual manifestation of this phenomenon and to examine its psychometric properties in a sample of theology students. The scale development study was conducted with a total of 453 undergraduate theology students studying at Bayburt University in the 2025-2026 academic year, including 163 participants in the exploratory validation phase and 290 participants in the confirmatory validation phase. Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA), Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA), Cronbach's Alpha coefficient, and Pearson correlation analysis were used for data analysis. The EFA indicated that the scale had a three-factor structure —Disconnection from the Divine, Alienation from the Belief System, Religious Social Alienation— which explained 57.66% of the total variance. The CFA results confirmed that the 18-item structure demonstrated a good fit to the data. The internal consistency of the scale was found to be high. In terms of criterion-related validity, a positive and significant correlation was found between the SMS and the Negative Religious Coping scale. The findings indicate that the Spiritual Monachopsis Scale is a valid and reliable instrument for assessing levels of spiritual homelessness and alienation, particularly among theology students. It is recommended that the SMS be used in future studies within higher religious education settings and campus-based spiritual counseling contexts to identify patterns of alienation in this population and to inform supportive psychoeducational programs.