Spiritual significance
Thinking from God's perspective decreases biased valuation of the life of a nonbeliever
Jeremy Ginges et al.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 12 January 2016, Pages 316-319
Abstract:
Religious belief is often thought to motivate violence because it is said to promote norms that encourage tribalism and the devaluing of the lives of nonbelievers. If true, this should be visible in the multigenerational violent conflict between Palestinians and Israelis which is marked by a religious divide. We conducted experiments with a representative sample of Muslim Palestinian youth (n = 555), examining whether thinking from the perspective of Allah (God), who is the ultimate arbitrator of religious belief, changes the relative value of Jewish Israelis' lives (compared with Palestinian lives). Participants were presented with variants of the classic "trolley dilemma," in the form of stories where a man can be killed to save the lives of five children who were either Jewish Israeli or Palestinian. They responded from their own perspective and from the perspective of Allah. We find that whereas a large proportion of participants were more likely to endorse saving Palestinian children than saving Jewish Israeli children, this proportion decreased when thinking from the perspective of Allah. This finding raises the possibility that beliefs about God can mitigate bias against other groups and reduce barriers to peace.
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Wen He & Maggie (Rong) Hu
Journal of Banking & Finance, March 2016, Pages 205-215
Abstract:
We examine whether religion affects the terms of bank loans. We hypothesize that lenders value the traits of religious adherents, such as risk aversion, ethical behavior and honesty, and thus offer favorable loan terms to religious borrowers. Consistent with this hypothesis, we find that corporate borrowers located in counties with a high level of religiosity are charged lower interest rates, have larger loan amounts and fewer loan covenants. These results suggest that the corporate culture of borrowers influences the availability and cost of bank loans.
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Teaching and Learning to Be Religious: Pedagogies of Conversion to Islam and Christianity
Juliette Galonnier & Diego de los Rios
Sociology of Religion, forthcoming
Abstract:
Drawing on in-depth interviews and ethnographic data, this article provides one of the first empirical analyses of religious classes for converts in the United States. Focusing on "new member classes" in two religious communities (a Muslim association and an evangelical Christian church), we introduce the concept of "pedagogies of conversion" to describe how religious organizations teach converts about their new religion and set up guidelines to frame the conversion process. By examining the pedagogical tools that religious instructors use on a daily basis to foster spirituality among new members, we investigate how converts learn to become religious people. We demonstrate that while there are significant differences in the doctrines (know-what) being taught in the Muslim and evangelical classrooms, the tips and pieces of advice delivered by instructors on how to be religious (know-how) are strikingly similar.
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Imagining Atheists: Reducing Fundamental Distrust in Atheist Intergroup Attitudes
Jordan LaBouff & Annie Ledoux
Psychology of Religion and Spirituality, forthcoming
Abstract:
Atheists represent both one of the largest groups in the landscape of belief and one of the most universally derogated groups in American society. Two studies investigate the factors underlying negative and positive attitudes toward atheists. Study 1 demonstrates that religious fundamentalism and distrust uniquely predict more negative attitudes toward atheists. Study 2 investigates the malleability of intergroup attitudes toward atheists through an imagined interaction exercise. Participants who imagined an interaction with an atheist (relative to those who thought about atheists) reported less distrust toward atheists, and more willingness to engage and cooperate with atheists. These effects persisted even among those relatively high in religious fundamentalism.
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Demanding the Divine? Explaining Cross-National Support for Clerical Control of Politics
David Buckley
Comparative Political Studies, forthcoming
Abstract:
What explains cross-national variation in support for religious politics? More precisely, why do even observant believers show uneven demand for clerical control of politics? In contrast to theoretical alternatives, I argue that demand for clerical control of politics is a sign of relative weakness tied to low popular religious participation, which alters the risks and benefits of clerical political involvement. Two social mechanisms explain this relationship in contexts of active religious participation: strong networks between religious and state elites, and high levels of political diversity within religious communities. World Values Survey data provide statistical evidence that (a) support for clerical involvement in politics among regular participators is highest and (b) gaps between high and low religious participation citizens are largest where aggregate participation is lowest. Qualitative evidence regarding the theory's mechanisms draws on field interviews in the Philippines during recent church-state tension.
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Men, Muslims, and Attitudes toward Gender Inequality
Danielle Lussier & Steven Fish
Politics and Religion, forthcoming
Abstract:
Gender-based inequality is often regarded as a salient characteristic of Muslim societies, yet few works have systematically compared the status of women in Muslim and non-Muslim communities. Fish (2011) finds a gender gap in structural indicators of inequality in Muslim-majority countries that cannot be explained by levels of economic development, raising questions about whether attitudes favoring inequality are more prominent among Muslims. We investigate the impact of structural-situational factors and religious identification on attitudes toward gender-based inequality using hierarchical-level models. We find that: (1) Muslim self-identification and the size of a country's Muslim population predict attitudes supportive of inequality; (2) an individual's gender has a stronger effect on attitudes than does religious identification; and (3) measures of structural inequality also shape attitudes. The effects of these variables remain strong when we consider other contextual elements, such as gross domestic product per capita, education, age, location in the Middle East, and fuels dependence.
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The consequences of religious strictness for political participation
Charles Dahan & James Monogan
Social Science Journal, forthcoming
Abstract:
Contemporary media portray highly religious Americans as active political conservatives. This article examines how church strictness influences political participation by churchgoers. We argue that church strictness influences aspects of a person's life that are known to influence political participation, so assessing the effect of religion on participation requires considering intermediate factors. To evaluate our theory, we analyze the 2006 Portraits of American Life Study, which focused on the role of religion in society. We develop a recursive model of political participation, using multiple imputation to address missingness in the survey. The results indicate that indirect effects of strictness - through civic involvement, income, and religious participation - mitigate the assumed direct effect of strictness upon political participation. We conclude that, although religious groups show political activism in some specific arenas, strict churches are not strong political mobilizers in general, as many media portrayals may lead one to believe.
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Gendering (Non)Religion: Politics, Education, and Gender Gaps in Secularity in the United States
Joseph Baker & Andrew Whitehead
Social Forces, forthcoming
Abstract:
Gender gaps in religiosity among Western populations, such that women are more religious than men, are well documented. Previous explanations for these differences range from biological predispositions of risk aversion to patriarchal gender socialization, but all largely overlook the intersection of social statuses. Drawing on theories of intersectionality, we contribute to the cultural and empirical analysis of gender gaps in religiosity by documenting an interactive effect between gender, education, and political views for predicting religious nonaffiliation and infrequent attendance at religious services among Americans. For highly educated political liberals, gender gaps effectively disappear, such that men and women are almost equally likely to be secular (or religious). The results have implications for the long-standing disputes about the gendered "nature" of religiosity and highlight the importance of multiple intersecting statuses and modalities in shaping aggregate patterns of religiosity and secularity.
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Moral foundation priorities reflect U.S. Christians' individual differences in religiosity
Kathryn Johnson et al.
Personality and Individual Differences, forthcoming
Abstract:
The moral domains of loyalty, authority, and purity have been linked with both religion and conservatism in Moral Foundations Theory. Yet there are important individual differences in religiosity. We sought to provide a more nuanced understanding of the relations between religiosity, conservatism, and the moral foundations identified in MFT. Participants were 450 Christians who completed an online survey assessing outreaching faith, religious commitment, belief in an authoritarian God, Biblical literalism, and the prioritization of each of the five moral foundations. Conservatism and religious commitment were significant positive predictors of Loyalty. Controlling for conservatism and religious commitment, we found that Fairness was predicted by outreaching faith; Care was positively predicted by outreaching faith and negatively predicted by belief in an authoritarian God; Authority was predicted by literalism; and Purity was predicted by literalism and authoritarian God representations. Our results highlight the need to consider individual differences in religious beliefs in theorizing about moral foundations.