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THE GENDER GAP IN RELIGIOUS VALUES – NORRIS AND INGLEHART 2/10/2008 1:10:07 PM

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[1st Draft: Total length 11,606 words]

Existential security and the gender gap in religious values

Pippa Norris (Harvard University) and Ronald Inglehart (University of Michigan)

Pippa Norris Ronald Inglehart McGuire Lecturer in Comparative Politics Institute for Social ResearchJohn F. Kennedy School of Government University of MichiganHarvard University Ann Arbor,Cambridge, MA 02138 Michigan, [email protected] [email protected] www.pippanorris.com www.worldvaluessurvey.org Synopsis: A pervasive generalization in the social sciences suggests that women are universally more religious in their attitudes, values and behavior than men ‘around the world and across the centuries’, leading Stark (2002) to propose a physiological or biological root cause. Yet a recent comparison of a wide range of world faiths suggests that the standard view needs revision. Far from a universal phenomenon, Sullins (2006) reports that the size of the gender gap in religiosity varied by type of indicator and by type of culture. In particular, among those of Jewish and Muslim faith, compared with women, men were significantly more active in collective religious rituals, not less. Moreover Miller and Stark (2002) found that, contrary to expectations, the gender gap in religiosity was weaker in societies where traditional sex roles predominated. Reframed in this light, the puzzle becomes how to explain variations in the gender gap in religiosity. This study develops the argument that disparities in existential security can help to explain this phenomenon, and then analyzes structural and attitudinal indicators to test this account. Data is derived from five waves of the World Values Survey from 1981-2006, covering almost half the world’s countries, and most major types of religious cultures. The conclusion draws together the main findings and considers their implications for understanding religious practices and behaviors. Draft chapter for the SSRC conference on Religion & International Affairs, New York, February 15-16, 2008 and the edited volume by Timothy Shah, Alfred Stepan, and Monica Toft


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Are women more religious than men? For many decades the standard perspective in the

literature has asserted that they are, whether gauged by religious identities, values, or practices.

Over the years a wealth of empirical studies in the scientific study of religion have demonstrated

that, at least in predominately Protestant and Catholic cultures, church congregations are

disproportionately female, while women were also more likely to express faith in God and to hold

religious beliefs (Argyle and Beit-Hallahmi 1975; Walter and Davie 1998; Miller and Hoffman

1995; Francis 1997). A number of alternative explanations have been proposed to account for

this long-standing pattern, based on structural and cultural theories of sex-role differentiation.

The apparent ubiquity of this phenomenon led Stark (2002) to speculate about a physiological or

biological root cause, with testosterone encouraging men to take greater risks, including

discarding the threat of eternal damnation in religions promising an afterlife.

Much of the systematic empirical evidence supporting the standard claim has been

gathered from historical censuses and social surveys, mainly conducted in predominately

Protestant and Catholic cultures in post-industrial nations. Until recently, however, little

systematic cross-national survey data has been available to test whether similar patterns hold

across a wider range of world faiths and in developing societies. The conventional wisdom was

recently challenged by Sullins (2006) who found that gendered patterns of religiosity varied both

by type of culture and by type of indicator, suggesting a more multifaceted reality. The study

expanded the comparative framework by analyzing 71 societies included in the 2nd and 3rd waves

of the World Values Survey conducted in the early to mid-1990s. In particular, Sullins confirmed

that women were indeed usually more religious than men in many religious cultures, especially in

the affective forms of religious expression reflecting personal spirituality, exemplified by feelings

of religious identity and the importance of religious values. By contrast, in many societies the

traditional gender gap was found to be far smaller, or even negligible, in collective forms of

religious rituals, such as church attendance and church membership in Protestant and Catholic

societies. Among Jews and Muslims, by contrast, the gap even reversed, with men being

significantly more active in religious practices than women. In addition, Miller and Stark (2002)

examined the gender gap in religiosity against several societal-level indicators of traditional and

egalitarian sex roles, such as the proportion of women in the paid workforce and the fertility rate,

and found that the gap was weaker in societies where traditional sex roles predominated.

Reframed in this light, if these findings are indeed confirmed as robust in a broad range of

contexts and time-periods, universal physiological explanations become implausible, and the


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puzzle becomes how to explain more complex variations in the gender gap in religiosity around

the world.

To account for differences in the size and significance of the gender gap in religiosity,

Part I of the present analysis builds upon a theory of human existential security, originally

developed to explain cross-national patterns of religiosity and trends in secularization (Norris and

Inglehart 2004). The concept of ‘existential security’ is a broad and multifaceted notion but its

core meaning reflects the degree to which survival is seen as secure or uncertain. The degree to

which survival is seen as precarious or safe varies widely, which generates a series of testable

propositions. This argument is compared with accounts based on the psychological propensity to

take risks, as well as the standard sociological theories based on common structural differences

in men and women’s lives, such as patterns of child-rearing, marital status, and engagement in

the paid work-force, and cultural explanations based on sex-role socialization and attitudes

towards gender equality. The key research questions are whether the gender gap in religious

values is universally evident across most nations, religious cultures, and types of society, and

whether the effect of gender on religious values weakens once models control for indicators of

existential security, social structure and cultural attitudes?

Part II describes the survey evidence, comparative framework, and measures.

‘Religiosity’ is understood here as a multi-dimensional concept open to many different indicators,

but nevertheless not all of these are equally suitable for comparative studies covering many

different world religions. In particular, the comparison of specific spiritual beliefs and particular

sacred rituals are problematic to interpret cross-culturally, as it remains difficult to establish

indicators which are functionally-equivalent in diverse world religions. For this reason, in this

study we decided to focus on the religious values gender gap, defined and measured as the

difference in the perceived importance of religion in the lives of women and men. This is one of

the most important indicators of spirituality, it is universal across all types of world faith and all

forms of New Age spirituality, and religious values are also a strong predictor of other religious

practices and attitudes (Norris and Inglehart 2004). To replicate, update, and expand many other

comparative studies, empirical evidence is derived from the World Values Survey, including all

five waves conducted from 1981-2006, covering over 85 percent of the world’s population and

most of the major world religions (with a total sample of 342,737 individual respondents). Part

III compares the descriptive bivariate correlations for structural and cultural factors associated

with religious values, estimating the size of the gender gap with each, and then uses multivariate


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OLS regression models to test the factors driving the gender gap in religious values. The

conclusion in Part IV draws together the major findings and considers their implications for

understanding social differences in religious practices and behaviors.

I: Theories explaining the gender gap in religiosity

A recent literature review by Francis (1997) noted that many studies have observed the

traditional gender gap in religiosity, but nevertheless the reasons underlying this phenomenon

continue to prove puzzling. Sociological accounts emphasize structural differences in men’s and

women’s lives which are thought to influence religiosity, such as patterns of child-rearing,

psychological versions emphasize female personality traits, while socio-biological explanations

propose physiological characteristics, such as levels of testosterone, which differentiate behavior

in women and men. The core argument advanced in this study is that the gender gap in

religious values should not be understood as sui generis; instead it can be explained most

satisfactorily by patterns of existential security, which also illuminate broader cross-cultural

differences in religiosity and secularization. Women often give higher priority to religion not

because of their sex per se but because they usually experience less security in their lives, due to

enduring and persistent disparities in physical strength, economic resources, and political power.

Elsewhere we have developed the argument that economic and political changes go

together with cultural developments in coherent and consistent ways (Norris and Inglehart 2004).

We have demonstrated that the process of human development has significant consequences for

religiosity; as societies transition from agrarian to industrial economies, and then develop into

postindustrial societies, the growing economic and physical security that usually accompany this

process tends to reduce the importance of religious values in people’s lives. The main reason, we

believe, is that the need for religious reassurance becomes less pressing under conditions of

greater existential security. These effects operate at both the societal-level (socio-tropic) and at

the personal level (ego-tropic), although the former seems to be more important. The concept of

‘existential security’ is complex and multidimensional, as many different types of threats may

engender perceived dangers and hardships in different contexts (Paris 2001; Ogata and Sen

2003). The 1994 UNDP Human Development Report argued that human security is shaped by

multiple threats arising from economic, food, health, environmental, personal, community and

political dimensions.1 Most postindustrial nations are characterized by conditions of widespread

social protection and control, high life expectancy, health and welfare services, a functioning and


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stable state, as well as conditions of enduring peace and security from external invasion, which

mean that although perceived dangers remain, existential security is maximized. Under these

conditions, the thesis predicts that fewer people in these societies will regard traditional spiritual

values, beliefs and practices as vital to their lives, or to the lives of their community. This does

not imply that all forms of religion necessarily disappear as societies develop; residual and

symbolic elements often remain, such as formal adherence to religious identities, just as church

buildings and cathedrals remain long after congregations have shrunk away, even when their

substantive meaning has faded away. But we expect that people living in advanced industrial

societies will often grow increasingly indifferent to traditional religious leaders and institutions,

and become less willing to engage in spiritual activities. Contrary to the assumptions of the

supply-side religious markets school (Finke and Stark 1992, 2000), we assume that the ‘demand’

for spirituality is far from constant; instead striking variations are evident in different societies

and groups due to experience of the basic living conditions, poverty, inequality, and freedom

from fear common in rich and poor nations.

Virtually all of the world's major traditional religious cultures provide reassurance that,

even though the individual alone can not understand or predict what lies ahead, a higher power

will ensure that things work out. Both religion and secular ideologies assure people that the

universe follows a plan, which guarantees that if you follow the rules, everything will turn out

well, in this world or the next. The rains will come, life will prosper, and (for religions believing in

an afterlife) the good will be rewarded and death will not end our contact with loved ones. This

belief reduces stress and uncertainty, enabling people to shut out terrifying anxieties and focus

on coping with their immediate problems. Without such a belief system, extreme stress and pain

tends to produce withdrawal reactions. Under conditions of insecurity, people have a powerful

need to see authority as both strong and benevolent-- even in the face of evidence to the

contrary. The theory is not mechanically deterministic: perceptions of threats can generate

increased fears even in affluent societies, as exemplified by the events of 9/11 and their

aftermath in the US. The thesis advanced in this study therefore predicts that the people of

poorer societies and more vulnerable sectors of society will usually regard religion as far more

important than more those of affluent nations and people living in states with generous welfare

safety-nets and with deeper reservoirs of household savings, private insurance, and investments,

which usually experience greater freedom from fear in their lives. Levels of social and individual

security are expected to lead towards predictable probabilistic variations in religious values


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(reflecting the vital importance of religion in people’s lives), although at the same time residual

religious beliefs, ritualistic practices and institutions will continue to bear a strong imprint

stamped by each specific type of faith.

How does this theory help to explain to the gender gaps evident in religious values? The

existence of enduring and deep-rooted differences in the way that women and men experience

existential security are widely recognized, as illustrated by unequal levels of economic resources

derived from subsistence farming, disparities in income, credit loans and debt, and the

feminization of poverty; by disparities in access to clean water, nutrition, and health care in

developing societies; by lack of power, representation in elected office, and voice in the public

sphere; and by the physical and social vulnerabilities which women face against threats from

aggression, the use of force, crime, and violence (including domestic violence). In short, feminist

perspectives call attention to the way that girls and women experience existential security

differently from boys and men, in large part because of enduring disparities in status and power

(Lammers 1999; Bunch and Carillo 1998). This is most vividly demonstrated in some of the

bloodiest civil wars, such as in contemporary Darfur, where reports by Amnesty International and

others have documented how far rape and other forms of sexual violence are being used as a

weapon of war in order to humiliate, punish, control, inflict fear and displace women and their

communities.2 But the contrasts in existential security experienced by most men and women go

far beyond the most extreme cases, and the international community, bilateral aid agencies, and

UN peace-building initiatives have increasingly come to recognize important contrasts in the way

that women and men experience development, military interventions, and civil conflict, with

important implications for effective development programs and policy interventions. The

argument developed here therefore builds on and extends our previous work by suggesting that

women generally give higher priority to religion in large part because of the disparities in safety,

protection, and security which they experience in their lives.

Is there convincing evidence that existential security is linked with religious values? And,

if so, does this help to explain the gender gap in religiosity? Despite the complexity of the core

concept of existential security, the thesis generates a series of clear hypotheses that can be

tested empirically. One central prediction is that the salience of religious values will tend to be

strongest in the least developed societies; the fact that this holds true has been demonstrated in

considerable detail elsewhere (Norris and Inglehart 2004). The people of low-income countries

are relatively vulnerable to life-threatening socio-tropic threats arising from sudden natural and


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man-made disasters, such as floods, famines, and social instability, and the appeal of religious

values is strongest in this context. The existential security thesis has attracted considerable

interest, with subsequent studies replicating the findings (Zaidise, Canetti-Nisim, and Pedahzur

2007).

Building upon this foundation, the thesis has a number of additional implications. Does

the salience of religious values vary according to the degree of existential security that different

groups within a given society experience? Of particular interest for the present analysis, does the

salience of religious values reflect the relative economic status, power, and sense of safety of

women and men living within given societies? This can be examined empirically by analyzing a

series of indicators, comparing the strength of religiosity against gender disparities in household

income, household savings, and the perceived importance of living in secure conditions. In

particular, underprivileged females living in households with a minimal income are predicted to

prove most religious in their outlook. Another test of the hypothesis can be made by examining

contrasts in household savings and debt. Here again, we would expect the most vulnerable

individuals with the least financial resources (a group that includes disproportionate numbers of

females) to give the highest priority to religion. The poor are most vulnerable to sudden

catastrophic economic risks, especially in the least developed societies, as they lack a safety-net

of personal savings to cushion the shock of bad times, such as a health crisis, crop failure, or lay-

offs. Educational and age patterns are also expected to prove important, with the less educated,

and the oldest (and thus most infirm) sectors of the population, giving the highest priority to

religious values. Existential security can also be monitored more directly by examining the

attitudes and priorities of those who say they give the greatest emphasis to living in safe

conditions which are free from danger; we would expect this group to be disproportionately

female—and to place relatively strong emphasis on religion.

Risk analysis and physiological differences

The existential security thesis can be compared with a growing series of studies which

link religiosity to more instrumental and individualistic notions of preferences for risk-taking. This

proposition was first outlined by Miller and Hoffman (1995), and subsequently developed by

Miller and Stark (2002) and Stark (2002). In religious cultures which emphasize the reward of life

after death for the devout, especially in Christianity, Islam, and Orthodox Judaism, their

argument suggests that to be irreligious is to risk divine punishment. It is well-established that


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men have a greater propensity to engage in risky behavior such as crime and delinquency,

drinking and drug use, whether due to male socialization processes or to socio-biological drives

linked with different levels of testosterone. This tendency, they argue, means that men are also

more likely to engage in risky behavior by being less religious. By contrast, women are generally

more risk-averse and therefore also more religious. The reasons why men are usually more

willing to take risks were not addressed by Miller and Hoffman (1995), but later Stark (2002)

proposed the socio-biological explanation, where higher testosterone levels in men encouraged

riskier behavior.

This risk preference thesis has received mixed support from the available empirical

survey evidence, however, in part because of alternative ways that risk preferences can be

operationalized and modeled. Miller and Stark (2002) observed significant correlations, while later

studies by Freese (2004), and by Roth and Kroll (2007), reported no relationship between risk

preferences and the gender gap in religiosity. The risk preference theory suggests an

instrumental notion, where individual men and women consciously weigh the costs and benefits

of alternative choices; for example, in Pentecostal churches, whether sins are worth the risk of

eternal damnation. By contrast, the existential security thesis offers a far broader framework

which relates to the generic threats and dangers facing societies, communities, and individuals.

The theoretical framework is also preferable because it offers a more comprehensive explanation;

it does not just seek to account for the gender gap in religiosity but it also provides insights into

many observable contrasts in patterns of secularization and religiosity. The results of the analysis

of existential security can also be directly compared empirically with the risk aversion thesis: if

the risk aversion thesis is correct, those who express a propensity for adventure and taking risks,

and for living an exciting life, should prove less religious in their values, as well as being

disproportionately male.

Structural differences in gender roles and cultural attitudes towards gender equality

In addition to testing these hypotheses, we can also test the implications of the

existential security thesis against those of other standard factors emphasized in the literature.

One of the most common structural theories in sociology emphasizes differences in the life-styles

of women and men, particularly the traditional roles of women as the primary child-rearer in the

home and the predominance of men in the paid labor-force and the public sphere (Becker and

Hofmeister 2001). A strict division of gender roles and responsibilities in the home, patterns of


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marriage and divorce, and the size and composition of the typical family unit, have changed

substantially over time, especially in post-industrial societies, but nevertheless women continue

to bear the primary responsibility for care of children and dependents (Mason and Jenson 1995;

Scott et al 1993, 1998). In particular, Azzi and Ehrenberg (1975) hypothesize that church

attendance may be higher for women if this represents an extension of the division of labor in

the home. Previous attempts to test these relationships, however, have reported mixed results;

De Vaus and McAllister (1987) examined Australian public opinion and found that mothers with

dependent children attended church more frequently than women without dependent children.

Similar patterns were also evident, however, for men with and without children. If the structural

proposition is true, however, it implies that the size of the gender gap in religiosity should shrink

among women who are in (full or part-time) paid employment, while it should expand among

women who are full time home-makers, especially if they care for dependent children. These

propositions can be tested empirically by examining whether the size of the gender gap in

religious values varies systematically according to marital status, the presence of children in the

household, and the respondent’s participation in the paid workforce, after controlling for other

important factors, including age and education.

Lastly, the cultural attitudes of women and men towards gender equality could also play

a role in determining patterns of religiosity (Walter and Davie 1998). If socialization patterns

encourage traditional roles for women and men, in which women accept that their primary

reward comes from being a wife and mother, then we would expect that these attitudes would

also contribute towards a gender gap in religion. Religious authorities often advocate that women

should remain in traditional roles in the domestic sphere and female fertility is encouraged, as

exemplified by Papal encyclicals in the Catholic Church banning abortion and the use of artificial

contraceptives. One of the central injunctions of virtually all traditional religions is to strengthen

the family, to encourage people to have children, to encourage women to stay home and raise

children, and to forbid abortion, divorce, or anything that interferes with high rates of

reproduction. In this respect, greater adherence to religious beliefs and practices may encourage

women to adopt traditional roles as full-time mothers and careers of dependents. Moreover those

who accept traditional gender roles may also feel that this includes engaging in religious values

and practices. This hypothesis can be tested by examining whether the size of the gender gap in

religious values expands among those women who accept the idea of traditional gender roles,


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while the gap diminishes among women who adhere to more liberal notions of gender equality in

the home, workplace and school.

II: Evidence, data and measures

Despite considerable debate, many of the theoretical arguments that have been

proposed over the years have not yet been tested empirically through multivariate analysis that

reveal whether given generalizations prove robust when controlling for different cultural contexts,

socioeconomic indicators, and time-periods. Moreover even where reliable empirical correlations

have been established, the direction of causality proposed in many accounts remains difficult to

interpret, in recursive relationships. Evidence for religious beliefs, values and behavior in many

different societies is available in the World Values Survey (WVS-5) which covers a wide range of

countries from all world regions, as well as many different types of faiths. The World Values

Surveys is a global investigation of socio-cultural and political change. This project has carried

out representative national surveys of the basic values and beliefs of the publics in more than 90

independent countries, containing in total almost 5.5 billion people or over 85% of the world’s

population and covering all six inhabited continents. It builds on the European Values Surveys,

first carried out in 22 countries in 1981. A second wave of surveys, in 41 countries, was

completed in 1990-1991; a third wave was carried out in 55 nations in 1995-1996; and a fourth

wave, with 59 countries, took place in 1999-2001. The fifth wave took place in over forty

countries in 2005-6.3 The total sample from all combined waves contains 342,737 individual

respondents.

The WVS survey includes some of the most affluent market economies in the world, such

as the U.S., Japan and Switzerland, with per capita annual incomes as high as $40,000; together

with middle-level industrializing countries including Taiwan, Brazil, and Turkey, as well as poorer

agrarian societies, exemplified by Uganda, Nigeria, and Viet Nam, with per capita annual incomes

of $300 or less. Some smaller nations have populations below one million, such as Malta,

Luxembourg and Iceland, while at the other extreme a billion or more people live in both India

and China. The survey contains predominately Protestant societies such as Australia, Sweden,

and the United States, Catholic societies including Belgium, the Philippines and Mexico, as well as

Orthodox countries such as Russia and Greece, and a few with diverse Eastern religions, such as

Japan, Viet Nam, and China. The survey also includes some of the first systematic data on public

opinion in many Muslim states, including Arab countries such as Jordan, Iran, Egypt, and


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Morocco, as well as Indonesia, Iran, Turkey, Bangladesh and Pakistan. The most comprehensive

coverage of countries in the surveys is available in Western Europe, North America and

Scandinavia, where public opinion surveys have the longest tradition, but countries are included

from all world regions, including several Sub Saharan African nations.

Measures of religiosity

Since religiosity is a multidimensional phenomenon, studies have focused on many

different aspects (Shiner 1966; Dobbelaere 1981; Swatos and Christiano 1999). Many sociologists

have emphasized trends in religious participation, monitored through church and census historical

records of congregations and through social surveys of reported churchgoing. It can be argued

that behavior provides a concrete indicator of the importance of religion for social norms and

habitual practices. Yet each major religion emphasizes its own distinct practices in spiritual

rituals, ceremonies, and observances, often associated with the life-changes of birth, marriage

and death, as well as celebration of certain holy days, and there are multiple variations within

each religion’s sects, denominations, and communities. Christian religious practices are

exemplified by habitual church attendance on Sundays and special holidays, as well as by the

role of prayer, charitable giving, the significance of communion, and the rituals of baptism,

confirmation, and marriage. But within this common repertoire, Anglicans, Methodists, and

Baptists each emphasize their own specific rituals. Elsewhere meditation rituals and ceremonies

are central to Buddhism, along with the observation of festivals, blessings and initiations, and the

role of monastic communities. For Muslims, the Qur-an specifies the five Pillars of Islam,

including public profession of faith by recitation of the shahada, daily performance of the salat

prayer ritual, annual giving of obligatory alms (zakat), fasting during Ramadan, and performance

once in a lifetime in the rituals of the Great Pilgrimage to Mecca (the Hajj). Alternative New Age

forms of spirituality involve an even wider range of diverse activities, including psychic, pagan,

metaphysical, personal growth and holistic healthcare, with practices exemplified by yoga,

meditation, aroma therapies, channeling, divination, and astrology. Given these differences, it

does not seem to be appropriate to use measures of participation in collective religious services

in cross-national studies covering many different types of faith and religious cultures. The

frequency of attendance at collective church services, for example, is widely used to compare the

size of Christian congregations in the United States, but this concept does not travel well as an

indicator of the strength of religious involvement in other faiths.


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Other commentators, such as Greeley (2003), give greater attention to the strength of

common religious beliefs, such as faith in an afterlife or in metaphysical beings, on the grounds

that people can continue to adhere to these beliefs even if they no longer participate regularly in

services of worship. But beliefs about specific theological doctrines, creeds, and injunctions vary

even more substantially across the major world faiths, as well as differing among specific sects,

denominations, and communities. The predominant religious cultural traditions in any society,

such as the legacy of Protestantism and Catholicism in Western Europe, are expected to leave a

distinct imprint upon the contemporary moral beliefs and social attitudes that are widespread

among the public in these nations. Predominant religious cultures are understood here as path-

dependent, adapting and evolving in response to developments in the contemporary world, and

yet also strongly reflecting the legacy of the past centuries. Yet the major faiths of the world

express divergent teachings and doctrines on many moral values and normative beliefs, such as

those surrounding the roles of women and men, the sanctity of life, and the importance of

marriage and the family. As a result, comparing the strength of religious beliefs is also

problematic for comparing like-with-like in cross-national studies.

The expression of subjective religious identities can also be compared across different

societies although their social significance remains unclear. Belonging to a particular sect, such as

the Shi’a or Sunni in Baghdad, or being part of Protestant or Catholic neighborhoods in Belfast,

may express genuine deeply-held membership of a community with a common shared culture.

But religious identities may also function as formal labels devoid of spiritual meaning; in Britain,

for example, a plurality of the population habitually report on official census forms that they are

nominal Anglicans, but beyond baptisms, weddings and funerals, this does not mean that they

are active, practicing members who regularly fill the pews in the Church of England (Furlong

1999).4

Yet others emphasize religion as a societal institution. Dobbelaere (1999), for example,

regards secularization as a broad process reducing the societal significance and meaning of

religion, notably how far the public regards spiritual values as important to their lives and how far

they listen to religious leaders as an important source of moral authority and spiritual guidance.

In this study, we do not examine direct evidence of the power and status of religious institutions

and authorities, such as the role of evangelical churches in the ‘bible-belt’ American South,

ideological divisions within the Anglican synod, the influence of radical Islamic parties in the

Middle East, or the structure, resources and leadership of the Roman Catholic Church in Italy.


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Nor do we focus primarily upon the relative organizational strength of different denominations

and sects within specific countries, and the way that this may affect women and men, such as

attempts to build churches and expand congregations by US evangelicals in South Korea, or

rivalry for hearts and souls between Catholic clergy and Pentecostal missionaries in Guatemala

and El Salvador. These are important matters, but it remains difficult to establish functionally-

equivalent survey items that would compare these issues among types of faith which encourage

different types of spiritual expression and rituals of behavior.

While recognizing that religiosity is multidimensional, in cross-national analysis, values

are most easily treated as functionally-equivalent indicators of this phenomenon. In general, the

study of values refers to the goals that people believe to be important for themselves, their

families, their community or the nation, such as the value of wealth and material prosperity, of

collective solidarity and social equality, of security and freedom from fear, and of individual

competition, hard-work, and enterprise. Religious values can be gauged by how far respondents

believe in the importance of God in monotheistic religions, or in the importance of the gods in

pantheistic religions. This is an important indicator since it has been established elsewhere

(Norris and Inglehart 2004) that religious values are strongly related to active participation in

collective religious services and to the frequency of individualized prayer or meditation. Not

surprisingly, where people thought that God was important in their lives, they were more likely to

engage in religious rituals and practices. Moreover religious values are also an important proxy

for societal patterns of secularization; we established that the strongest decline in religious values

has occurred in affluent and secure nations, where the importance of religion has faded most.

Secularization involves the lessening importance of religion in people’s lives, and growing

indifference to spiritual matters among the public. By contrast, where religious values continue to

remain a vital part of people’s everyday lives, in poor agrarian societies, where people are also

most active in worship and prayer. The 10-point ‘importance of God’ scale was carried in all five

waves of the World Values Survey, facilitating the broadest comparison over time and across

societies. To double-check on the robustness of this indicator, since 1990 the survey has also

monitored ‘the importance of religion’, using a 4-point scale. Models were replicated using this

indicator but this did not substantially alter the outcome of the analysis, lending greater

confidence to the results.

Identifying the predominant religious culture in each country is important because the

values and beliefs of Catholicism, Protestantism, Orthodoxy, Muslim and Eastern religions are


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expected to imprint themselves on each society, via the major channels of cultural transmission

and socialization, irrespective of how far individuals actively participate in religion. The

classification of the predominant religion in each society is drawn from the Encyclopedia

Britannica Book of the Year 2001, using a dataset on religious pluralism derived from this source

collected by Alesina and colleagues (2003).5 The classification of all the countries contained in

the combined WVS under this categorization is given in Table A1. Of all these, the categorization

of ‘eastern’ religions remains the most heterogenious, given the vast diversity of religions and

sects contained within this group. In addition, the classification is less useful in pluralistic

societies containing highly heterogeneous religious populations. The reliability and consistency of

the classification was crosschecked against alternative reference sources that are widely cited in

the research literature.6 The type of society was also classified into three categories using the

UNDP Human Development Index 2004, combining literacy and education, longevity and per

capita income (UNDP 2007). Details about the measures and classifications used for all variables

are given in the technical appendix. It should be noted that important differences in the countries

and the questions included in each wave of the survey limit the multivariate analysis, for example

the Schwartz value scales for the importance of ‘security’ and ‘risk’ were only contained in the

most recent (2005-6) wave. The earliest surveys were conducted mainly in Protestant and

Roman Catholic societies, so that time-series analysis over successive surveys is limited for other

types of religion.

III: Gender gaps in religious values

As a first step, to get a sense of the cross-cultural contrasts, we can start by comparing

the size of the gender gap in religious values by aggregating all five waves of the World Values

Survey from 1981 to 2006. The gender gap in each society is measured as the mean position of

women on the 10-point ‘importance of God’ scale minus the mean position of men. A positive

coefficient indicates that women are more religious in their priorities. An alternative comparison,

using the 4-point ‘importance of religion’ scale, generated similar contrasts, which increases

confidence in the results of the comparison, although this measure was not included in the first

wave of the survey.

Cross-cultural comparisons

Figure 1 illustrates the main cross-cultural contrasts, confirming the long-standing

observation that women tend to attach greater importance to religion than men in almost all


15

societies under comparison, and the gender gap is often fairly substantial in size. Nevertheless

despite this generalization, the societies vary in the size of the gender gap on the 10-point scale,

with the largest gender gap evident in Orthodox societies such has Hungary, Russia, Ukraine, and

Belarus, where the church had been suppressed for decades by the Communist state; in Italy,

Portugal and Spain in Catholic Europe, as well as in Norway and Finland, two relatively secular

Evangelical-Lutheran cultures. A wide range of faiths and levels of development are evident in

the middle range of the scale while at the opposite pole there is a minimal gender gap in

religious values, and even a modest reversal, found in some Muslim states such as Saudi Arabia,

Pakistan, Jordan, Indonesia, Iraq, Morocco and Egypt. Many of those living in Muslim cultures

express such a universally high level of religiosity that a ‘ceiling’ effect may operate in the scale,

flattening any social differences.

[Figure 1 and Table 1 about here]

To examine the societal-level factors linked with religious values more broadly we can

compare the salience of religion at aggregate level by type of society, by the major types of

world religion, and by world region, starting with bivariate descriptive statistics. Confirming the

existential security thesis, Table 1 illustrates that religion was generally regarded as far more

important in agrarian societies, classified by the UNDP as the lowest level of human

development; on the 10-point scale of the importance of God, there was a 3-point gap between

people living in the more affluent post-industrial nations (mean 6.35) and those living in agrarian

societies (mean 9.45). This is consistent with what we have documented elsewhere (Norris and

Inglehart 2004) where we have shown that similar disparities exist between rich and poor nations

in many other indicators of religiosity, such as in patterns of participation in collective religious

rituals and practices. Religion is almost universal in some of the poorest developing countries

under comparison, such as Pakistan, Ghana and Indonesia, while by contrast, although there are

a few notable exceptions such as Italy, Ireland, and the United States, many other affluent

societies such as Sweden, Japan, Australia, and France are among the most secular around the

globe. The comparison by the major type of world religious culture also shows significant

differences, with the predominately Muslim cultures attaching by far the greatest importance to

spiritual values, while Jewish and Catholic cultures proved moderate, while Protestant and

Orthodox religious cultures generally proved more secular.7 The comparison by world regions

confirmed the patterns observed for development, with Scandinavia and Western Europe proving


16

the most secular, which the Middle East and North Africa, and Sub-Saharan Africa, were the most

religious.

[Table 2 about here]

At the same time, when we examine the gender gap in religious values, the opposite

patterns can be observed; as Miller and Stark (2002) noted, the gender gap is greatest in post-

industrial societies while it diminishes to insignificance in poorer agrarian societies. The gap is

also strongest in the more secular Orthodox and Protestant cultures, while shrinking in Muslim

nations. And the gap is also largest in Scandinavia and Western Europe. All of these patterns

suggest that processes of secularization and human development, diminishing the importance of

religion in people’s lives in many of the most affluent societies, have affected men more than

women, widening the religious gender gap. Table 2 describes the bivariate correlations at

societal-level between the mean importance of religion for women and for men, as well as the

size of the gender gap, compared against a range of standard indicators of human development

and existential security, including per capita GDP (in purchasing power parity), the Human

Development Index, the Gender-related Development Index, and measures of infant mortality,

life expectancy, fertility rates and female literacy rates. All the indicators prove to be strongly

correlated in the expected direction; women are far more religious in developing societies with

higher poverty, shorter life-spans, greater fertility and lower literacy for women. But at the same

time these factors also proved to be equally or even more strongly correlated with male

religiosity. As a result the gender gap is reversed; women remain more religious than men in

more affluent societies that have experienced greater human development. Thus religiosity for

both men and women tends to be far stronger in developing societies, but the religious gender

gap seems to expand with processes of modernization.

[Table 3]

Within-society comparisons

To explore these phenomena further, let us compare men and women’s religiosity within

given societies. Table 3 provides similar comparisons of the mean importance of religion scale

among men, women, and the resultant gender gap, across a range of social sectors and

demographic groups in the pooled sample across all waves of the World Values Survey.

Household income was classified into deciles in each society. Consistent with the existential

security thesis, the level of household income on the 10-point scale was strongly correlated with


17

the distribution of religious values, with a 1.5 point gap between rich and poor. This means that

the across-nation contrasts between agrarian and post-industrial societies was therefore roughly

twice as strong as the within-nation comparison of rich and poor social sectors, but both point

consistently in the direction expected by the existential security thesis. Religion was seen as more

important for poor women than for rich women and similar contrasts by household income group

were also observed among men. Nevertheless women were under-represented (46%) in the

more affluent group, while they constituted 56% of the lowest income group. We also find a

relationship with reported household savings, where those who reported saving money were less

religious than those who experienced debt. Health showed similar patterns, with those reporting

that they experienced poor health proving more religious than those saying that they were in

very good condition. Similarly with age, the elderly were more religious than the young, as were

the less educated compared with those with greater education. Those looking after dependent

children were also more religious than those without children at home, as well those engaged in

home-care compared with those in the paid workforce. By contrast, marital status did not prove

to be significantly related to religiosity. In short, across most of the standard social and

demographic variables, relatively strong religiosity was consistently found among the less well-off

sectors of society, who tend to be more vulnerable to threats and dangers, including the poor

and indebted, the elderly, the less educated, and those in poor health. Moreover there are more

women than men in each of these populations; women are roughly 51.5% of the total population

in the database as a whole, but they constitute 56% of the elderly, 56% of the poorest income

group, and 59% of those with ill-health, and 98% of the home-makers in the world.

[Table 4 about here]

Cultural attitudes and religiosity

All the social and demographic indicators which we have compared, and which are

associated with the underlying concept of existential security, are therefore consistent predictors

of the salience of religious values, but is there more direct attitudinal evidence? If we examine

the cultural indicators, in Table 4, we can monitor attitudes towards security, risk and the gender

equality scale. The Schwartz values scales contained in the fifth wave of the WVS asked

respondents how well given values described themselves. As Table 4 shows, people who

expressed a strong propensity to seek secure living conditions away from danger were also highly


18

religious, while those who did not, proved more secular. This provides direct evidence in support

of the existential security thesis.

We can also compare these results with the Miller and Stark (2002) thesis which predicts

that in religions promising an afterlife, the propensity to take risks will be associated with more

secular orientations, as well as being a more male characteristic. The Schwartz value scale asked

respondents about the value of adventure, taking risks, and having an exciting life. Contrary to

the Miller and Stark thesis, the results in table 4 show that those who were attracted to risks and

adventure were more religious on average than those who were not. Therefore although women

were disproportionately more likely to give high priority to security, while men were far more

likely to value taking risks, emphasis on security proved a better predictor of the gender gap in

religiosity than did one’s emphasis on risk-taking. Lastly, the gender equality scale is also

strongly correlated with religiosity; those expressing the most traditional views of women’s roles

in education, employment and political leadership also give the highest priority to spiritual values.

This relationship, however, is probably recursive; many religious faiths and spiritual authorities

emphasize a traditional division of sex roles in the home, family and public sphere, so that

participation in religious activities is likely to reinforce these values, while at the same time those

holding more egalitarian values may be less likely to be attracted to participate in religious

organizations.

To summarize the bivariate analysis in the pooled WVS across all waves, Figure 2

illustrates the size of the gender gap in religious values (the 10-point importance of God scale)

across the range of societal-level and individual-level factors discussed here. As the bar chart

shows, the gender gap was strongest in post-industrial societies, especially in relatively secular

Scandinavia and Western Europe, as well as among the lowest income sectors of society, those

with the worst state of health, the elderly, those who actively prioritize security, and those with

egalitarian values towards gender equality. Women predominate in all these groups, associated

with long-standing and well-established patterns of female poverty, inequality, and status,

greater longevity, and men and women’s cultural attitudes. By contrast, it is worth noting ‘the

dog that did not bark:’ the religious gender gap is relatively small or inconsistent according to

marital status and the propensity to take risk.

The Schwartz value items were only included in the fifth wave of the WVS survey so the

multivariate analysis is limited to this wave, currently containing 44 societies and 61,618


19

respondents.8 To analyze the relationship between the religious gender gap and these structural

and cultural factors, these were entered into successive multivariate OLS regression models, with

the religious values (importance of God) scale as the dependent variable. Similar models were

run for the 4-point ‘importance of religion’ scale, for replication, and the results proved robust.

The models present provisional results as it should be noted that the complete model reduced

the total number of cases substantially, due to problems of missing data. The first model entered

gender without any other factors. Model 2 enters the structural factors that were discussed

earlier, while Model 3 entered cultural attitudes, and Model 4 added the predominant religious

culture. The successive models provide a progressively better fit to the data (indicated by the

strengthening adjusted R2 coefficient). The key question is whether the impact of gender reduces

over successive models, once additional controls are introduced. Interestingly the significance

and size of the gender coefficient remains stable, so that the additional variables do not sharply

reduce the strength of the relationship. These are preliminary results and further analysis is

required but they suggest that the religious gender gap cannot be explained away by the

structural or cultural factors contained in this analysis. The other factors associated with religious

values prove largely stable and consistent in the strength, direction and significance of the

coefficient of association (B), across successive models. As observed earlier, religious values

are associated with living in poorer developing societies, with lower income households, with

lower education and household savings, with age, with not being married or in the paid

workforce, although it is with having children. The value of security is strongly and significantly

linked to religiosity in successive models, while the propensity to take risks is usually insignificant.

Overall the models suggest that the value of security is a stronger and more consistent predictor

of religious values than the propensity to take risks.

Conclusions

The religious values gender gap is an intriguing phenomenon which has been widely

observed over the years and yet often poorly explained. The standard accounts emphasize the

structural constrains on men and women’s roles in the home and workforce, as well as

psychological predispositions or characteristics, such as the propensity to seek risk. Often these

explanations have been examined in particular contexts and national studies, but the comparative

evidence provides important variations in different types of societies, religions and world regions.

There are many sociological and psychological accounts which have sought to attribute the gap

to structural and cultural characteristics of women and men. The argument developed here


20

suggests that in general patterns of religiosity are driven by the need for existential security;

where lives are vulnerable, risky and dangerous, religion fills a void and provides a sense of

safety and well-being. The evidence presented here gives further confirmation that security is

strongly related to feelings that God is important in people’s lives. The religious gender gap is

less about sex per se, but more about the way that many women’s lives are more vulnerable to

problems of endemic poverty, debt, poor health, old age, and lack of physical safety, all of which

mean that women give higher priority to security – and religion.


21

Figure 1: The gender gap in religious values by society

Note: Q: ”How important is God in your life? Please use this scale to indicate- 10 means very important and 1 means not at all important.” The ‘gender gap’ is the difference between the mean score for women and for men in each society. A positive gender gap indicates that religious values are more important for women than for men. Source: World Values/European Values Survey 1981-2006.

-0.40 -0.20 0.00 0.20 0.40 0.60 0.80 1.00 1.20 1.40 1.60 1.80

M aliSaudi Arabia

PakistanRwandaJordan

PhilippinesNigeria

ColombiaGhana

IndonesiaM orocco

IraqZambia

TanzaniaEgypt

A lgeriaIran

BangladeshVenezuela

Burkina FasoEl SalvadorGuatemala

Trinidad and TobagoM alaysia

BrazilPuerto Rico

PolandTurkeyChina

KyrgyzstanEthiopia

South Korea Azerbaijan

Viet NamSouth Africa

UgandaBosniaJapan

ZimbabwePeruIndia

Dominican RepublicM acedonia

SingaporeHong Kong

M exicoNetherlands

M altaEast Germany

TotalGeorgia

Czech RepublicUnited States

LuxembourgCyprus

SloveniaIsrael

FranceSerbia

BelgiumM ontenegro

ChileCroatiaTaiwanIreland

EstoniaRomania

SwedenGreeceAustriaA lbania

New ZealandM oldova ArgentinaDenmark

Northern IrelandGreat Britain

West GermanyAustralia

IcelandBulgaria

LatviaCanada

SwitzerlandNorway

ItalyLithuaniaAndorraUruguay

SlovakiaArmeniaUkraine

SpainFinlandBelarus

PortugalRussia

Hungary


22

Figure 2: Variations in the size of the gender gap in religious values

Note: Q: ”How important is God in your life? Please use this scale to indicate- 10 means very important and 1 means not at all important.” The ‘gender gap’ is the difference between the mean score for women and for men in each society. A positive gender gap indicates that religious values are more important for women than for men. For details of all items, see Technical Appendix A. Source: World Values/European Values Survey 1981-2006

0.990.40

0.07

1.020.90

0.820.73

0.520.17

1.181.06

1.030.76

0.470.41

0.170.16

0.720.64

0.700.73

0.620.54

0.580.54

0.530.57

0.530.54

0.460.47

0.840.76

0.630.53

0.280.65

0.79

0.590.71

0.690.74

0.460.52

0.70

0.540.56

0.600.76

0.751.06

0.230.51

0.630.63

0.861.27

0.550.600.62

0.760.65

0.60

0.380.490.510.53

0.640.70

0.810.96

1.02

0.00 0.20 0.40 0.60 0.80 1.00 1.20 1.40

Post-industrialIndustrialAgrarian

OrthodoxProtestant

CatholicJewish

EasternMuslim

ScandinaviaW.Europe

C. & E. EuropeNorth AmericaSouth America

Asia PacificM.East & N. Africa

Africa

Highest decile9th8th7th6th5th4th3rd2nd

Lowest income

Saved money Just got by

Spent savings Debt

PoorFair

GoodVery good

In paid workforceHome-care

Retired

Without dependent childrenWith dependent children

Married/living togetherNot married/living together

High educationMedium

Low education

TwentiesThirtiesFortiesFiftiesSixties

Seventies+

Much like meLike me

Somewhat like meA litt le like me

Not like meNot at all like me

Much like meLike me

Somewhat like meA litt le like me

Not like meNot at all like me

Most traditional2345678

Most egalitarian

Type

of

society

Type

of relig

ious

cultu

reRe

gion

Inco

me

HH S

avings

Hea

lthW

orkfor

ceCh

ildren

Marita

l

status

Educ

ation

Age co

hort

Seek

sec

urity

Take

Risks

Gen

der eq

uality sc

ale


23

Table 1: Societal-level variations in the gender gap in religious values % Female

Gender Gap

Men Women All Sig.

51.60 Type of society Post-industrial 0.99 5.84 6.83 6.35 52.40 Industrial 0.40 7.96 8.36 8.16 49.10 Agrarian 0.07 9.38 9.45 9.42 54.10 Type of religious

culture Orthodox 1.02 5.96 6.98 6.47

52.90 Protestant 0.90 5.74 6.64 6.19 51.70 Catholic 0.82 6.80 7.62 7.21 55.00 Jewish 0.73 7.37 8.10 7.74 49.30 Eastern 0.52 5.57 6.09 5.83 50.40 Muslim 0.17 9.28 9.45 9.37 49.8 Region Scandinavia 1.18 4.25 5.43 4.84 52.2 Western Europe 1.06 5.55 6.61 6.10 53.4 Central & Eastern

Europe 1.03 5.62 6.65 6.17

50.6 North America 0.76 7.69 8.45 8.07 51.7 South America 0.47 8.71 9.18 8.95 49.4 Asia Pacific 0.41 6.74 7.15 6.94 50.2 Middle East and N.

Africa 0.17 9.46 9.63 9.55

49.0 Sub-Saharan Africa 0.16 9.30 9.46 9.37 51.4 ALL 0.65 6.76 7.41 7.08 Note: Q:”How important is God in your life? Please use this scale to indicate- 10 means very important and 1 means not at all important.” The ‘gender gap’ is the difference between the mean score for women and for men in each society. A positive gender gap indicates that religious values are more important for women than for men. ANOVA was used to test the coefficient of association (Eta) and the significance of the mean group difference between men and women. P.*** =.001. For details of all items, see Technical Appendix A. N. societies 90. Source: World Values/European Values Survey 1981-2006


24

Table 2: Societal-level variations in the gender gap in religious values correlated with indicators of existential security Religious values scale For

women For men

Gender gap

N. countries

GDP per capita (ppp) 2005 (World bank 2007) -.414** -.441** .377** 86

Human development index 2005 (UNDP 2007) -.556** -.614** .612** 86

Gender-related development index (GDI) value 2005 (UNDP 2007)

-.564** -.625** .627** 82

Gender empowerment measure (GEM) value 2005 (UNDP 2007)

-.449** -.513** .551** 67

Infant mortality rate (per 1000 live births) 2005 (World bank 2007)

.478** .534** -.553** 88

Life expectancy at birth (in years) 2000-2005 (UNDP 2008)

-.419** -.473** .506** 85

Total fertility rate per woman, 2000-2005 .447** .514** -.587** 85

Female adult literacy rate, 2002 (UNDP 2004) -.483** -.555** .613** 64

Note: Religious values are measured by the ‘Importance of God’ 10-point scale aggregated at national

level in the pooled World Values Survey 1981-2006 for women, for men, and for the gender gap. **.

Pearson correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed). N. societies 67-88.


25

Table 3: Social variations in the gender gap in religious values % Female Gender Gap Men Women All Si

g. 45.9 Income Highest income decile 0.72 5.91 6.63 6.27 45.7 9th 0.64 6.24 6.88 6.56 48.0 8th 0.70 6.54 7.24 6.89 48.4 7th 0.73 6.61 7.34 6.98 48.9 6th 0.62 6.85 7.47 7.16 50.5 5th 0.54 7.04 7.58 7.31 49.9 4th 0.58 7.13 7.71 7.42 52.0 3rd 0.54 7.20 7.74 7.47 54.8 2nd 0.53 7.46 7.99 7.73 56.5 Lowest income 0.57 7.71 8.28 8.00 47.3 HH Savings Saved money last year 0.53 7.23 7.76 7.50 51.6 Just got by 0.54 7.54 8.08 7.81 52.2 Spent some savings 0.46 7.53 7.99 7.76 52.6 Spent savings+borrowed

money 0.47 7.80 8.27 8.04

59.2 Health Poor 0.84 6.90 7.74 7.40 55.0 Fair 0.76 6.83 7.59 7.25 49.6 Good 0.63 6.98 7.61 7.26 46.9 Very good 0.53 7.04 7.57 7.29 41.4 Workforce In paid workforce 0.28 6.71 6.99 6.85 98.2 Home-care 0.65 7.15 7.80 7.48 50.8 Retired 0.79 6.31 7.10 6.71 44.7 Children Without dependent children 0.59 6.52 7.11 6.82 53.5 With dependent children 0.71 6.84 7.55 7.20 50.1 Marital

status Married/living together 0.69 6.75 7.44 7.10

53.8 Not married/living together 0.74 6.76 7.50 7.13 46.8 Education High education 0.46 6.56 7.02 6.79 50.4 Medium 0.52 6.56 7.08 6.82 54.4 Low education 0.70 7.09 7.79 7.44 50.6 Age cohort Twenties 0.54 6.35 6.89 6.62 51.4 Thirties 0.56 6.24 6.80 6.52 50.9 Forties 0.60 6.14 6.74 6.44 51.5 Fifties 0.76 6.17 6.93 6.55 52.2 Sixties 0.75 6.31 7.06 6.69 56.0 Seventies+ 1.06 6.45 7.51 6.98 51.5 ALL 0.71 7.46 6.75 7.12 Note: Q: ”How important is God in your life? Please use this scale to indicate- 10 means very important and 1 means not at all important.” The ‘gender gap’ is the difference between the mean score for women and for men in each society. A positive gender gap indicates that religious values are more important for women than for men. N. 342,737. The correlation (R) and significance. P.*** =.001. For details of all items, see Technical Appendix A. Source: World Values/European Values Survey 1981-2006


26

Table 4: Cultural variations in the gender gap in religious values % Female Gender Gap Men Women All (Sig.)

55.3 Seek security Much like me 0.23 8.02 8.25 8.14 52.0 Like me 0.51 7.18 7.69 7.45 49.6 Somewhat like me 0.63 6.60 7.23 6.92 48.9 A little like me 0.63 6.34 6.97 6.66 44.5 Not like me 0.86 5.99 6.85 6.42 45.7 Not at all like me 1.27 6.13 7.40 6.77 42.1 Take Risks Much like me 0.55 7.75 8.30 7.98 43.3 Like me 0.60 7.31 7.91 7.57 45.9 Somewhat like me 0.62 6.97 7.59 7.25 49.4 A little like me 0.76 6.65 7.41 7.03 56.3 Not like me 0.65 6.74 7.39 7.10 61.7 Not at all like me 0.60 7.11 7.71 7.48 35.4 Gender equality scale Most traditional 0.38 8.61 8.99 8.80 37.6 2 0.49 8.01 8.50 8.26 41.1 3 0.51 7.99 8.50 8.25 44.0 4 0.53 7.89 8.42 8.16 48.9 5 0.64 7.52 8.16 7.84 51.7 6 0.70 7.24 7.94 7.59 55.9 7 0.81 6.90 7.71 7.31 62.3 8 0.96 6.61 7.57 7.09 66.7 Most egalitarian 1.02 6.13 7.15 6.64 51.5 ALL 0.71 7.46 6.75 7.12 Note: Q: ”How important is God in your life? Please use this scale to indicate- 10 means very important and 1 means not at all important.” The ‘gender gap’ is the difference between the mean score for women and for men in each society. A positive gender gap indicates that religious values are more important for women than for men. The correlation (R) and significance. P.*** =.001. For details of all items, see Technical Appendix A. Source: World Values/European Values Survey 1981-2006


27

Table 5: Multivariate models of the gender gap in emphasis on religion, 2005-6 Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4

B Std. Error

Beta P B Std. Error

Beta P B Std. Error

Beta P B Std. Error

Beta P

(Constant) 7.48 0.03 0.000 10.71 0.13 0.000 9.01 0.17 0.000 7.71 0.16 0.000

Female gender 0.59 0.04 0.10 0.000 0.63 0.04 0.11 0.000 0.59 0.04 0.10 0.000 0.59 0.03 0.10 0.000

SOCIAL STRUCTURE

Human development index, 2005 -4.97 0.11 -0.31 0.000 -4.69 0.12 -0.30 0.000 -4.82 0.12 -0.30 0.000

Income (10 pt scale) -0.04 0.01 -0.03 0.000 -0.04 0.01 -0.03 0.000 -0.02 0.01 -0.02 0.006

State of health 0.11 0.02 0.03 0.000 0.09 0.02 0.02 0.000 0.15 0.02 0.04 0.000

Education scale -0.09 0.01 -0.06 0.000 -0.09 0.01 -0.06 0.000 -0.07 0.01 -0.05 0.000

Household savings -0.14 0.02 -0.04 0.000 -0.14 0.02 -0.04 0.000 -0.09 0.02 -0.03 0.000

Age in years 0.01 0.00 0.04 0.000 0.01 0.00 0.04 0.000 0.01 0.00 0.04 0.000

R in paid workforce -0.14 0.04 -0.02 0.000 -0.12 0.04 -0.02 0.001 -0.01 0.04 0.00 0.721

Married -0.34 0.04 -0.06 0.000 -0.34 0.04 -0.06 0.000 -0.26 0.04 -0.04 0.000

With children 0.46 0.06 0.06 0.000 0.42 0.06 0.05 0.000 0.51 0.05 0.07 0.000

CULTURAL ATTITUDES

Impt to live in secure surroundings 0.34 0.01 0.14 0.000 0.27 0.01 0.12 0.000

Impt to have adventure & take risks 0.01 0.01 0.01 0.253 0.02 0.01 0.01 0.039

Gender equality scale -0.01 0.01 0.00 0.523 -0.06 0.01 -0.04 0.000

RELIGIOUS CULTURE

Protestant culture 1.03 0.06 0.14 0.000

Catholic culture 2.78 0.05 0.44 0.000

Muslim culture 1.94 0.06 0.26 0.000

Orthodox culture 1.76 0.07 0.19 0.000

Adjusted R2 0.01 0.109 0.13 0.24

Note: The dependent variable is religious values, measured at individual-level by Q: ”How important is God in your life? Please use this scale to indicate- 10 means very important and 1 means not at all important.” The columns represent theunstandardized (B) regression coefficients, standard errors, standardized Betas, and their significance (P). See Appendix A for details in the technical appendix. Source: World Values/European Values Survey fifth wave (2005-6). N=44 societies.


28

Appendix A: Variables and codings SOCIETAL INDICATORS AND CLASSIFICATIONS Human Development Index

The Human Development Index (HDI) is based on longevity, as measured by life expectancy at birth; educational achievement; and standard of living, as measured by per capita GDP (PPP $US). UNDP Human Development Report 2006.

Type of society ‘Postindustrial societies’ were defined as the twenty most affluent states around the world, ranking with a HDI score over .900 and mean per capita GDP of $29,585. ‘Industrial societies’ are classified as the 58 nations with a moderate HDI (ranging from .740 to .899) and a moderate per capita GDP of $6,314. Lastly, ‘agrarian societies’ are the 97 nations with lower levels of development (HDI of 739 or below) and mean per capita GDP of $1098.

Type of predominant religious culture

The classification of the major religion (adhered to by the largest population) in all 193 states around the world is based on the CIA. The World Factbook, 2001. (Washington, DC: Central Intelligence Agency). Source: http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook

Type of religion V185: “Do you belong to a religious denomination? [IF YES] Which one?” Coded: No, not a member; Roman Catholic; Protestant; Orthodox (Russian/Greek/etc.); Jewish; Muslim; Hindu; Buddhist; Other.

CULTURAL INDICATORS Gender equality scale

The combined gender equality scale is based on the following 3 items: MENPOL Q118: “On the whole, men make better political leaders than women do.” (Agree coded low); MENJOBS Q78: “When jobs are scarce, men should have more right to a job than women.” (Agree coded low); BOYEDUC Q.119: “A university education is more important for a boy than a girl.” (Agree coded low) Source: World Values Surveys, pooled 1995-2006

Security “Now I will briefly describe some people. Using this card, would you please indicate for each description whether that person is very much like you, like you, somewhat like you, not like you, or not at all like you? Living in secure surroundings is important to this person; to avoid anything that might be dangerous.”

Risk propensity “Now I will briefly describe some people. Using this card, would you please indicate for each description whether that person is very much like you, like you, somewhat like you, not like you, or not at all like you? Adventure and taking risks are important to this person; to have an exciting life.”

STRUCTURAL INDICATORS Paid work status “Are you employed now or not?” Coded full-time, part-time or self-employed (1),

other (0). Education ” What is the highest educational level that you have ever attained?” Coded on a 9-

point scale from no formal education (1) to university level with degree (9). Source: World Values Surveys

HH Income V253. “On this card is a scale of incomes on which 1 indicates the “lowest income decile” and 10 the “highest income decile” in your country. We would like to know in what group your household is. Please, specify the appropriate number, counting all wages, salaries, pensions and other incomes that come in.”

HH savings V251. “During the past year, did your family: Save money (4); Just get by (3); Spent some savings (2); Spent savings and borrowed money (1).”

State of health All in all, how would you describe your state of health these days? Very good (1), good (2) fair (3), or poor (4).”

Age V236. Coded from date of birth in continuous years. Married V55. “Are you currently: 1 Married, 2 Living together as married.” Children V56. “Have you had any children?” Yes 91), No (0)


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Table A1: Classification of countries in all waves of the World Values Survey by type of predominant religious culture Roman Catholic Protestant Muslim Orthodox Eastern Jewish Total

Andorra Australia Albania Armenia China Israel

Argentina Denmark Algeria Belarus India

Austria Estonia Azerbaijan Bulgaria Japan

Belgium Finland Bangladesh Cyprus Korea, Republic Of

Brazil Germany Bosnia & Herzegovina Ethiopia Singapore

Canada Ghana Burkina Faso Georgia Taiwan

Chile Iceland Egypt Greece Viet Nam

Colombia Latvia Indonesia Macedonia

Croatia Netherlands Iran Moldova

Czech Republic New Zealand Iraq Romania

Dominican Republic Norway Jordan Russian Federation

El Salvador South Africa Malaysia Ukraine

France Sweden Mali Yugoslavia

Hungary Switzerland Morocco

Ireland Tanzania Nigeria

Italy Uganda Pakistan

Lithuania United Kingdom Saudi Arabia

Luxembourg United States Turkey

Malta Zambia

Mexico Zimbabwe

Peru

Philippines

Poland

Portugal

Rwanda

Slovakia

Slovenia

Spain

Trinidad & Tobago

Uruguay

Venezuela

Total nations in WVS 31 20 18 13 7 1 90

Total nations in world 63 37 50 13 15 1 181

% included in WVS 49.2 54.1 36.0 100.0 46.7 100.0 49.7

Note: Nation states classified from predominant religion, (see text for details)


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Notes

1 1994. UNDP Human Development Report. New York: Oxford University Press/UNDP. 2 Amnesty International. 2004. Sudan: Darfur: Rape as a weapon of war: sexual violence and its consequences. http://www.amnesty.org/en/report/info/AFR54/076/2004. 3 Full methodological details about the World Values Surveys, including the questionnaires, sampling procedures, fieldwork procedures, principle investigators, and organization can be found at: www.worldvaluessurvey.org 4 As an indicator of the meaningless of religious identities, in the 2001 UK Census, due to an internet write in campaign, 0.7% of the population reported in the religious question that they were "Jedi Knights", equivalent to the proportion in England who reported that they were Sikhs. 5 The dataset is available at www.stanford.edu/~wacziarg/papersum.html

6 David B. Barrett, George T. Kurian and Todd M. Johnson. 2001. World Christian Encyclopedia: A Comparative Survey of Churches and Religions in the Modern World. Oxford: Oxford University Press. For details see Table 1.1. See also Philip M. Parker. 1997. Religious Cultures of the World: A Statistical Reference. Westport, Conn: Greenwood Press; David B. Barrett and Todd M. Johnson. 2001. World Christian Trends AD 30-2200. Pasedena, CA: William Carey Library; Global Evangelization Movement. 2001. Status of Global Mission 2001. www.gem-werc.org/; CIA The World Factbook,. http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/

7 The ‘Eastern’ religions also proved less religious in their values according to this measure but it is difficult to interpret this category given the diversity of types of religion, and the existence of pantheistic religions in this group.

8 It should be noted that the 5th wave of the World Values Survey remains under development and further countries will be added to the final dataset and analysis.

existential security and the gender gap in religious values the gender... · and become less...

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