Toward the Scientific Study of Polytheism: Beyond Forced‐Choice Measures of Religious Belief

Abstract

This article argues that zero‐sum, forced‐choice approaches to measuring religious belief do not work well outside of the Abrahamic world. Positive‐sum approaches to measuring religious beliefs (in the plural) are better suited to the study of polytheistic societies. Using results from a nationally representative survey conducted in 2011 Taiwan, we demonstrate that in a polytheistic society like Taiwan, religious belief is not zero sum. We also contrast our results with those of the Taiwan Social Change Survey (TSCS), and seek to show that our positive‐sum approach to measuring religious beliefs can help us better understand the disparate causes and consequences of different religious beliefs in polytheistic societies. The challenge of Christocentrism in quantitative studies of religion is also discussed.

Christian Identification and Self‐Reported Depression: Evidence from China

“…Despite these merits, some caveats and limitations are worth mentioning. One caveat concerns the possibility that individuals in a polytheistic society may maintain multiple religious identities (Gries, Su, and Schak ). Such a possibility is not accommodated in the CGSS 2010, where, like many other large‐scale surveys, respondents may only choose one religious identity from a given list.…”

East Asian religious tolerance versus Western monotheist prejudice: The role of (in)tolerance of contradiction

“…Moreover, a recent study shows that Buddhists easily tolerate alternative knowledge systems, such as science, which may contradict their religious views (Clobert & Saroglou, 2015). It is therefore not surprising that religions in East Asia are frequently blended without any difficulty under the same temple roof (Gries, Su, & Schak, 2012).…”

Dissociation, Paranormal Belief, and Quality of Life in Older People

“…The rest were classified into the medium religious piety group. It should be noted that adjusting the visual prompts depicting prayer, meditation, worship, financial donation, and other common religious practices in relation to the religious context of the participant's self-claimed religion type complies in principle with the "positive-sum" approach Gries et al (2012) suggested for use in Taiwan in differentiation from the more commonly used "zero-sum" approaches.…”

“…They also tend to be more reserved in the expression of their religious views. Moreover, a recent study by Gries, Su, and Schak (2012) also revealed that the traditional zero-sum approach (religious activities classified exclusively into one specific religion type) to measuring religiosity as found in literature to date has many problems when applied in a polytheistic society like Taiwan.…”

“…Toward this end, an increasing number of health researchers are calling for religion to be integrated into clinical practices, especially in older populations (Bush et al, 2012;Weaver, Flannelly, Strock, Krause, & Flannelly, 2005). Therefore, this study intends to examine the effect of religion on the quality of life in Taiwanese older people by using a construct called religious piety applicable to the local settings based on a positive-sum approach (allowing religious activities to be cross-referenced among different religion types) for measuring religiosity as recommended by Gries et al (2012). More importantly, the construct of religiosity will be related to the quality of life through cognitive dissociation and paranormal belief as two potential mediators under the framework of the "ritual healing theory" proposed by McClenon (2005).…”