Experiencing the Sacred Image: Psychometric Validation of the Fresco Experience Scale in Orthodox Contexts

Objective: To develop and validate the Fresco Experience Scale (FES), a multidimensional measure of typical (recalled) engagement with Eastern Orthodox church frescoes.Methods: In a preregistered study, 778 adults from Serbia (Mage = 27.97, SD = 11.63) completed the 36-item FES together with measures of aesthetic engagement, religiosity, daily spiritual experiences, national identification, and dispositional traits. Ordinal confirmatory factor analyses (WLSMV) compared competing structural models, and measurement invariance was examined across gender and religious affiliation. Two abbreviated forms (FES-30 and FES-24) were also evaluated.Results: A correlated six-factor model comprising Visual-Aesthetic, Emotional, Cognitive, Communicative, Spiritual-Transformative, and Sociocultural facets showed adequate fit, CFI = .953, TLI = .949, RMSEA = .082, SRMR = .050, and outperformed a unidimensional alternative; a higher-order model fit acceptably but somewhat less well. Subscale reliability was high. Facet scores correlated positively with aesthetic engagement, religiosity, and national identification, and more weakly with daily spiritual experiences. Measurement invariance was supported across gender, but across religious affiliation only configural and partial metric invariance were established, precluding mean-level comparisons. Both short forms retained the six-factor structure, with the FES-24 emerging as the most promising brief form pending cross-validation in independent samples.Conclusions: The FES provides reliable, theoretically interpretable facet scores for profiling sacred-image engagement with Orthodox frescoes. A total score may be used as a global summary index, but facet-level interpretation remains primary. Current evidence is strongest for Orthodox or Orthodox-proximal settings.