Date
9-17-2026
Department
Rawlings School of Divinity
Degree
Doctor of Philosophy in Christian Leadership (PhD)
Chair
Joan Appleton
Keywords
Trait emotional intelligence, resilience, biblical spiritual formation, leadership, Christian female leaders, construct validation, psychometric integration.
Disciplines
Christianity | Leadership Studies
Recommended Citation
Calio, BreLynn G Nikoleta, "Creating a Multi-Level Assessment of Biblical Resilience, Emotional Spiritual Intelligence, and Spirit-Driven Leadership for Christian Female Leaders" (2026). Doctoral Dissertations and Projects. 8925.
https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/doctoral/8925
Abstract
Christian women tend to do best in leadership when they can incorporate their Christian faith and a higher mastery of emotional intelligence. In addition, resilience is essential to biblical spiritual formation and emotional intelligence. Therefore, the purpose of this exploratory sequential mixed-method study was to explore the nature of emotional intelligence traits and resilience display through a biblical spiritual formation lens and the study’s leadership model, THRIVE Spirit-Driven Leadership, with Christian female leaders by developing a multidimensional assessment that combines all of these areas. The study utilized a Delphi method and an expert panel to first collect qualitative data regarding emotional intelligence traits utilization and resilience display in conjunction with biblical spiritual formation and from a THRIVE Spirit-Driven Leadership perspective and then collect quantitative data to further define the results. The resulting data influenced the development of a multi-level quantitative assessment combining secular models with biblical spiritual formation in the context of the study’s leadership model. Two consecutive pilot tests were performed, and each time the assessment was adjusted based on feedback and statistical analysis. The resulting assessment, the L-BRESQi, was administered to a larger group of Christian female leaders to evaluate preliminary reliability and exploratory construct validity, which reduced the assessment to its final version that displayed acceptable to excellent internal consistency and acceptable to good model fit. This supported the findings that the Resilience Display domain predicted THRIVE Spirit-Driven Leadership. However, the Emotional Intelligence Traits domain did not significantly predict THRIVE Spirit-Driven Leadership. Instead, a simple mediation analysis showed that Resilience Display fully mediated the relationship between Emotional Intelligence Traits and THRIVE Spirit-Driven Leadership.
