Abstract:

The purpose of this article is to produce a literature review (1958-2020) out of Turkish psychology of religion studies on religious development in childhood. In this context, researches on ‘religious development in childhood’ "books, theses, articles, papers, translations and encyclopaedia article" from 1958 to 2020, were grouped together according to the variety of academic products. In this article, which provides the opportunity to observe the development and change that occurred in these studies from 1958 to 2020 as a whole, the method of literature survey was made use of methodologically. Including the Turkish literature in this article, it is also aimed to eliminate the need for resource scanning for researchers who plan to conduct research on 'religious development in childhood' of religious development periods. In line with the aims, it was determined in the conclusion of the article that; considering the quantitative distribution of academic products by types, 4% of the scanned sources were books (n = 11), 55% of them were theses (n = 178), 27% of them were articles (n = 86), 11% of them were papers (n = 36) and 3% were found to be translations (n = 10). During the scanning on the subject it has been also determined that there is a very limited number of encyclopaedia articles (n = 1). According to all of this variety of quantitative products, it was determined that a total of 322 sources were scanned. When a general evaluation is made based on the literature review on religious development in childhood (1958-2020) upon such a period of development in question, it is notable that researches in Turkey are carried out mainly by pedagogues of religion. Therefore, it can be said that the psychology of religion literature created on the religious development in childhood shows a quantitative decrease compared to that of the religious education. The reason for this night be that the number of pedagogues of religion working in the field of religious education in Turkey is greater than that of psychologists of religion. In addition, the following suggestions can be presented for researchers’ use working in the field of psychology of religion: (i)-In order to enrich the Turkish psychology of religion literature, some suggestions and principle decisions should be made in annual psychologists of religion meetings to encourage the production of thesis, studies as well as publications on religious development in childhood. (ii)-Bibliography and literature studies should continue at regular intervals in order to update the studies in the aforementioned period of development. Thus, it may be easier for psychologists of religion to study on this subject to access the mentioned resources and overcome problems related to the lack of studies in literature.

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