Shaping attitudes about homosexuality: The role of religion and cultural context

Across the globe, the debate over homosexuality continues, with great variation in public opinion about the acceptability of homosexuality, laws regulating same-sex unions and penalties for homosexual sex behaviors. Religion is often seen as an important predictor of attitudes about homosexuality. H...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Social science research 2009-06, Vol.38 (2), p.338-351
Main Authors: Adamczyk, Amy, Pitt, Cassady
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Affiliation
Attitude
Attitudes
Catholic
Cross-Cultural Comparison
Cross-national analysis
Crosscultural Differences
Cultural Characteristics
Cultural environment
Cultural identity
Cultural Values
Culture
Economic development
Gay
Gays & lesbians
History of medicine and histology
Homosexuality
Homosexuality - psychology
Humans
Law Enforcement
Lesbian
Lesbianism
Multilevel Analysis
Muslim
Prejudice
Protestant
Public Opinion
Religion
Religious Beliefs
Religious influences
Social Acceptance
Social Attitudes
Social Perception
Socioeconomic Factors
Tolerance
Values
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Across the globe, the debate over homosexuality continues, with great variation in public opinion about the acceptability of homosexuality, laws regulating same-sex unions and penalties for homosexual sex behaviors. Religion is often seen as an important predictor of attitudes about homosexuality. However, cross-national differences in cultural orientations suggest that the role religion has in explaining homosexual attitudes may depend on a nation’s cultural context. In this study, we merge ideas from cultural sociology and religious contextual effects to explain cross-national variation in public opinion about homosexuality. Using data from the fourth wave of the World Values Survey and Hierarchical Modeling techniques, we find support for the micro and macro effects of religion and a survival vs. self-expressive cultural orientation. Moreover, we find that personal religious beliefs have a greater effect on attitudes about homosexuality in countries like the United States, which have a strong self-expressive cultural orientation.
ISSN:0049-089X
1096-0317
DOI:10.1016/j.ssresearch.2009.01.002