Education and religion: Individual, congregational, and cross-level interaction effects on biblical literalism

Abstract

a b s t r a c tUsing ideas from cultural and organizational theory, I examine the interplay of individual and congregation-level educational attainment on biblical literalism. Data on 387 congregations and 100,009 worshippers (US Congregational Life Survey, 2001) are used to test hypotheses. Results indicate that the effects of congregational education and individual educational attainment are among the largest effects in models. This study is the first to show that regardless of an individual's own education, affirmations of biblical literalism are less likely when persons with higher education dominate a congregation. This finding brings into relief the important role of social context in persons' belief in biblical literalism. Additionally, congregational education amplifies the influence of individual education on biblical literalism such that the gap in belief between college/non-college education individuals widens in high education congregations. This finding suggests that high education persons more deeply absorb the influence of a more educated congregational context.

Biblical Conservatism and Psychological Type

“…Older people tended to be generally more biblically liberal, and this was true across all traditions. The liberalising effect of education on biblical and theological conservatism has been widely reported (Reimer, 2010;Stroope, 2011;Zigerell, 2012). Here, the effect of education on reducing biblical conservatism was apparent overall, but analysis within traditions showed this was not so among evangelicals, which is in line with an earlier study of literalism in a different sample of Church of England laity (Village, 2005b).…”

The Role of Religion in Parenting Satisfaction and Parenting Stress Among Young Parents

“…In addition to the parenting benefits of normative affirmation, involvement in a religious community may also create more positive parenting attitudes among parents. Such involvement, typically measured by an individual's frequency of attendance at religious worship services, has been shown to buffer the deleterious effects of stress exposure (Williams et al ; Ellison et al ) and to be inversely related to reported levels of stress (Ellison et al ; Lawler and Younger ), at least in part by providing social resources through community and congregational support and prescriptive norms that help regulate behavior and provide a sense of coherence and meaning (Ellison ; Ellison and George ; Lim and Putnam ; Stroope ; Stroope, Draper, and Whitehead ).…”

Small Groups, Contexts, and Civic Engagement: A Multilevel Analysis of United States Congregational Life Survey Data

“…Applied to the present analysis, if overall congregational small group structure maintains an environment encouraging service to others, this context can ratify beliefs and behaviors of service fostered at the level of individual small group participation. Existing research on congregations is consistent with this view, showing that congregation-level educational attainment increases the effects of individual education on religious belief (Stroope 2011b). In this way, social context changes the balance between potentially competing ideologies, with the possibility that one ideology or set of actions will win.…”

“…We discuss the implications of this coding in the discussion section. Dichotomous variables are commonly used in congregational studies using the US CLS(Dougherty and Whitehead 2010;Draper 2014;Martinez and Dougherty 2013;Stroope 2011aStroope , 2011bStroope and Baker 2014).…”