scholarly journals Visualizing Change in Ordinal Measures: Religious Attendance in the United States (1972–2018)

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
pp. 237802311990006
Author(s):  
Michael Lee Wood
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
General Social Survey ◽  
The United States ◽  
Relative Increase ◽  
Religious Attendance ◽  
Social Survey ◽  
Self Reports ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Different Levels ◽  
Over Time

The figure plots self-reports of religious attendance using data from the General Social Survey (1972–2018), contributing to current debates about how religiosity is changing in the United States by clearly showing the relative increase or decrease of each level of religious attendance over time. The main new insight is that the observed decline in religious attendance in the United States has been driven primarily by a large increase in people reporting never attending religious services and a corresponding decrease in people reporting weekly attendance, rather than uniform changes across different levels. Some categories, such as attendance once a month, have seen virtually no change. More generally, the figure may be used as a template for plotting other ordinal measures over time, such as political attitudes or ideology.

Religion and Happiness

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Hout ◽  
Andrew Greeley
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Religious Affiliation ◽  
General Social Survey ◽  
The United States ◽  
Religious Groups ◽  
Social Survey ◽  
Religious Rituals ◽  
Religious Services ◽  
Using Data ◽  
International Social

This chapter discusses the link between happiness and religion. It draws on meaning-and-belonging theory to deduce that a religious affiliation heightens happiness through participation in collective religious rituals. Attendance and engagement appear key: a merely nominal religious affiliation makes people little happier. Notably, two religious foundations of happiness—affiliation with organized religious groups and attendance at services—have fallen. Softened religious engagement, then, may contribute to the slight downturn in general happiness. In fact, steady happiness is reported among those who participate frequently in religious services, but falling levels among those who are less involved. The chapter also considers the association between religion and happiness outside the United States using data from the International Social Survey Program, an international collaborative survey to which the General Social Survey contributes the American data.

Belief in Heaven and Hell among Christians in the United States: Denominational Differences and Clinical Implications

2003 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
pp. 155-168 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julie Juola Exline
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
General Social Survey ◽  
The United States ◽  
Religious Participation ◽  
Clinical Implications ◽  
Current Analysis ◽  
Social Survey ◽  
Impending Death ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Afterlife Beliefs

In situations involving impending death or bereavement, afterlife beliefs may become salient. Although prior studies have examined afterlife beliefs, little attention has been devoted to the specific constructs of Heaven and Hell. Using data from United States Christians in the 1998 General Social Survey, the current analysis revealed that the majority believed in both Heaven and Hell. Fundamentalist Protestants reported greater belief in Heaven and Hell than Catholics, Mainline Protestants, or Liberal Protestants. Regardless of denomination, greater religious participation was associated with greater belief in an afterlife, Heaven, and Hell. Clinical implications are discussed. For example, whereas thoughts of Heaven should comfort those facing death, the possibility of Hell could intensify distress around the loss. When practitioners work with individuals facing death—either the client's own impending death or the death of another person—it may be helpful to carefully assess the client's specific beliefs about the afterlife.

The Arts as a Polarized Issue and the Role of Political Trust in Promoting the Arts: Evidence From the United States

2021 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 85-97
Author(s):  
Lim Jae Young ◽  
Woo Harin
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
General Social Survey ◽  
Strong Support ◽  
Political Trust ◽  
The United States ◽  
Social Survey ◽  
The Arts ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Moderating Role

The arts in the United States, for a long time received strong support from both sides of the political aisle. However, in recent years, the arts have been transformed into a partisan issue that pits conservatives against liberals. The article points to the importance of political trust as a means of helping conservatives overcome their ideological inclinations and support the arts. Scholars argue that political trust influences more strongly individuals who perceive a given policy to be one that imposes ideological risks for them compared with those without such risks. Focusing on the moderating role of political trust, the article examines whether political trust can help alleviate the conservatives’ hostility to the arts. Relying on the 2016 General Social Survey, the article finds that conservatives have no direct relationship with arts spending, but they will be more likely to support arts spending when this is contingent upon political trust.

scholarly journals Moving a Mountain: The Extraordinary Trajectory of Same-Sex Marriage Approval in the United States

2017 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
pp. 237802311772765 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael J. Rosenfeld
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Public Opinion ◽  
Gay Rights ◽  
General Social Survey ◽  
The United States ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Same Sex Marriage ◽  
Small Set ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Election Studies

Most public opinion attitudes in the United States are reasonably stable over time. Using data from the General Social Survey and the American National Election Studies, I quantify typical change rates across all attitudes. I quantify the extent to which change in same-sex marriage approval (and liberalization in attitudes toward gay rights in general) are among a small set of rapid changing outliers in surveyed public opinions. No measured public opinion attitude in the United States has changed more and more quickly than same-sex marriage. I use survey data from Newsweek to illustrate the rapid increase in the 1980s and 1990s in Americans who had friends or family who they knew to be gay or lesbian and demonstrate how contact with out-of-the-closet gays and lesbians was influential. I discuss several potential historical and social movement theory explanations for the rapid liberalization of attitudes toward gay rights in the United States, including the surprising influence of Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign.

scholarly journals Gendered Religiosity

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Landon Schnabel
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Gender Differences ◽  
Social Identity ◽  
General Social Survey ◽  
The United States ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Social Survey ◽  
Gender Expression ◽  
The Feminine

This study uses measures of cognitive and expressive aspects of gender as a social identity from the General Social Survey to examine whether and how they relate to religiosity. I find that religiosity is clearly gendered, but in different ways for women and men. Consistent with the feminine-typing of religion in the Christian-majority context of the United States, gender expression is linked with more religiousness among women but not men. Consistent with religion being a sometimes patriarchal institution, those with more pride in being men are more religious. I conclude that religiosity is gendered, that degendering and secularization processes could go hand-in-hand, and that future research on gender differences in religiosity should further examine variation among women and among men.

Understanding Female Gun Ownership

2016 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 43-71 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria D. H. Koeppel ◽  
Matt R. Nobles
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Survey Data ◽  
Fear Of Crime ◽  
General Social Survey ◽  
The United States ◽  
Gun Ownership ◽  
Social Survey ◽  
Male And Female ◽  
Nationally Representative ◽  
New Research

This research examines female gun ownership trends from 1973 to 2010. Nationally representative General Social Survey data are used to compare rates for male and female gun ownership. In light of the specific marketing trends by gun manufacturers beginning in the mid-1990s as well as previous findings within the literature, we test (a) whether an increase in female gun ownership is observed from 1973 to 2010, (b) whether female gun owners report increased fear of crime, and (c) the extent to which other gun-owning motivations, especially hunting, shape women’s gun ownership. Our analysis confirms a decline in women’s gun ownership, but in contrast to previous studies emphasizing a link between fear of crime and female gun ownership, we find that hobbies and lifestyle factors may better explain women’s interests in firearms. We could conclude by highlighting avenues for new research that better take into account the heterogeneity of gun ownership in the United States.

scholarly journals Leftists possess more national consensus in Europe in one of two datasets

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark John Brandt ◽  
Anthony Aron ◽  
Megan Parker ◽  
Cristina Rodas ◽  
Megan Shaffer
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
American Politics ◽  
National Level ◽  
The United States ◽  
European Social Survey ◽  
Data Sources ◽  
Social Survey ◽  
Ideological Differences ◽  
National Consensus ◽  
Using Data

A regularity in US American politics is that liberals have more policy consensus than do conservatives, and both ideological groups have more consensus than moderates (Ondish & Stern, 2018). The idea is that conservatives’ local conformity paradoxically results in less consensus than liberals at the national level. If this is the case, then the liberal consensus effect should also be observed in other countries. We test this using data from Europe. In the European Social Survey (Country N = 38, N = 376,129) we find that on average leftists have more consensus than do rightists; however, we do not find this using the Eurobarometer (Country N = 18, N = 375,830). In both data sources we also observe variation in ideological differences between countries. These results suggest that there is a liberal/leftist consensus effect that can be found in Europe and the United States, but there are also exceptions.

Political Identity and Confidence in Science and Religion in the United States

2020 ◽  
Vol 81 (4) ◽  
pp. 439-461
Author(s):  
Timothy L O’Brien ◽  
Shiri Noy
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Political Identity ◽  
General Social Survey ◽  
The United States ◽  
Science And Religion ◽  
Public Perceptions ◽  
Social Survey ◽  
Political Identities ◽  
Moral Claims ◽  
The Relationship

Abstract This article investigates changes in public perceptions of science and religion in the United States between 1973 and 2018. We argue that the deepening ties between science and religion and opposing moral claims reconfigured the relationship between political identities and confidence in science and religion during this period. Our analysis of 30 waves of General Social Survey data finds that while Republicans once were more likely than Democrats to be more confident in science than religion, Democrats are now more likely to than Republicans. And, while Democrats used to be more likely than Republicans to be more confident in religion than science, this difference also reversed. These findings underscore the growing importance of political identities as predictors of confidence in science and religion and suggest that the politicization of science and religion fueled a perception that they provide not just alternative frameworks but opposing ones.

Crime, Punishment, and Social Disorder

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
James D. Wright ◽  
Jana L. Jasinski ◽  
Drew Noble Lanier
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Public Opinion ◽  
General Social Survey ◽  
The United States ◽  
Crime Rates ◽  
Social Disorder ◽  
Social Survey ◽  
Crime And Punishment ◽  
Changing Attitudes ◽  
First Time

In 1980, Arthur Stinchcombe, Tom Smith, Garth Taylor, and several additional coauthors published Crime and Punishment—Changing Attitudes in America. The book reviewed public opinion data from the first five or six waves of the General Social Survey (GSS), plus a large number of pre-GSS polls and surveys dating back to the 1930s, all dealing with attitudes of the American public toward crime, punishment, and social disorder. This chapter revisits the principal findings, themes, and conclusions of Crime and Punishment in light of what is now 30-plus years worth of GSS data. In addition, for the first time since Crime and Punishment was published, the United States has recently experienced a sharp decline in crime rates that began in about 1994 and continued for a decade. Thus, the chapter also explores the apparent effects of declining crime rates on Americans' attitudes about crime, punishment, and related matters.

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