Prejudice Towards Muslims: A Study among Young People in the North-West Region of Cameroon

ABSTRACT

Muslims and Christians in Cameroon have coexisted for decades within a shared context, but there are no studies that seek to understand the nature of Christian–Muslim intergroup relations within the Cameroonian context. Based on a sample of (n = 501) young people, this study examines how young people who identify as Christians feel towards Muslims, and the extent to which the perception of threat from Muslims predicts feelings of prejudice towards them. This study particularly utilizes the integrated threat theory (ITT) of prejudice as a suitable theoretical framework for understanding intergroup attitudes. The basic assumption of ITT is that the perception of threat leads to prejudicial feelings towards outgroups. In addition, this study explores the relationship between contact with Muslims, threat perception and prejudice. The findings reveal that Cameroonian Christian youths perceive Muslims as a threat and have some feelings of prejudice towards them. In addition, the perception of threat was a significant predictor of prejudice towards Muslims. Contrary to our expectation, contact with Muslims was positively related to perceived threat and prejudice towards Muslims. Implications and directions for future research are also discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Cameroon
• integrated threat theory
• intergroup contact
• Muslims
• Christians

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).