How Religious Characteristics Are Related to Attitudes toward GLB Individuals and GLB Rights

Abstract

Two studies conducted in the United States investigated whether individuals’ religious characteristics (e.g., orthodoxy, evangelism, literal interpretism, quest, extrinsic religiosity) affect their attitudes toward gay, lesbian, and bisexual (GLB) individuals and GLB rights (marriage, adoption, sexual behavior). Orthodoxy, literal interpretism, evangelism, and extrinsic religiosity were all related to less support for GLB rights and less positive attitudes toward GLB individuals. Quest was not related to any measure. Results highlight the complexity of attitudes; for instance, a religious characteristic might predict attitude toward one right, but might not predict attitudes toward other rights. Findings further show what is known about how religious characteristics relate to support for GLB individuals and GLB rights.

KEYWORDS:

• religion
• attitudes
• religious characteristics
• GLB rights
• orthodoxy
• literal interpretism
• evangelism
• extrinsic religiosity
• religious quest

Notes

1. This act was found to be unconstitutional by the Arkansas Supreme Court in 2011.

2. The measures included in these studies generally ask participants to vote for or against legal actions (e.g., a ban on same-sex marriage). Voting in one direction is a vote in “support” of GLB rights, while voting in the other direction is a vote in “opposition” of GLB rights. For consistency's sake, we will discuss all measures in terms of “support” of GLB rights.

3. The term orthodoxy is used here; however, the scale used has also been called a “fundamentalism” scale (see Bornstein & Miller, 2009, for review), and indeed orthodoxy and fundamentalism share many similarities. Although there is some dispute whether the two are different or essentially the same, that is beyond the scope of this article, and we simply note that the measure used has been called both “orthodoxy” and “fundamentalism.”

4. Note, however, that Morrison and McDermott (2009) found that fundamentalism and support for GLB rights were negatively correlated; however, that study used a “fundamentalism” scale and not an “orthodoxy” scale. There is some debate as to the difference between fundamentalism and orthodoxy, though the two have enough similarity that one might assume that orthodoxy might also be negatively correlated to GLB rights.

5. Technically modern terms such as same-sex sexual behavior are not used in the Bible, but there are multiple passages that can be interpreted to suggest that same-sex relationships are forbidden.

6. Note that there is another, related religious orientation called “intrinsic religiosity” which is typically paired with “extrinsic religiosity”; however, intrinsic (i.e., internal) religiosity is not an external motivation and thus is not included here because it does not fit with the initial purpose of the article, which was to study beliefs and external motivations (but that discussion was cut due to reviewer comments). Furthermore, intrinsic religiosity has not been related to prejudice to the extent as extrinsic has, and thus there is less reason to include it in this study. As suspected, it was not related to the measures in this study.

7. The issue of same-sex marriage was presented as either spatially proximal (i.e., in the participant's hometown) or distant (in a distant town). Although the manipulated variables were not of interest in this study, they were controlled for in the analyses. Example summary is in the Appendix.

8. Participants first completed an experimental task that consisted of watching or reading about the 9/11 attacks, or Madrid terrorist attacks, or a neutral stimulus. Although the manipulated variables were not of interest in this study, they were controlled for in the analyses.