Attitudes toward and inferred beliefs for religious ingroup/outgroup members: Muslim children of Pakistani heritage in the United Kingdom and Saudi Arabia

ABSTRACT

The post-9/11 era has seen a surge in writings on “Muslim” issues in the West, but little is known about Muslim children's perspectives. Attitudes toward, and beliefs about, the religious ingroup and outgroup were examined in the present study with 5–6-year-old Muslims of Pakistani heritage in the United Kingdom (UK) and Saudi Arabia (SA). Participants completed trait attribution and liking tasks and answered questions on God beliefs and religious practice about themselves, Muslims (ingroup) and non-Muslims (outgroup). Participants described ingroup members more positively, liked them more, and inferred that they held more religious beliefs than outgroup members. Liking was positively associated with outgroup liking for UK participants, who described outgroup members more positively with more religious beliefs, compared with SA participants whose ingroup attitudes were negatively associated with outgroup attitudes. Our findings are discussed in the light of theory and research, and implications for education contexts and well-being are considered.

KEYWORDS:

• Muslim children
• Pakistani
• ingroup/outgroup
• attitudes
• religious beliefs

Acknowledgements

We thank the children that participated and the staff that helped to coordinate the fieldwork at the schools in both locations. Appreciation is due to the editor-in-chief and reviewers for their time and attention on the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Virginia L. Lam http://orcid.org/0000-0001-8408-3664

Notes

1 The location remained undisclosed to protect the anonymity of the school where there were only several of those schools with such characteristics in SA.

2 The school delivered an English-medium syllabus that paralleled that of the UK in terms of grades, term, and assessment toward qualifications from the English National Curriculum.

3 The school stated that, though some families were not “practicing” Muslims, they accepted or welcomed Islamic values as part of the school ethos and religious studies of the Qur’an.