Religion, Religiosity, and the Attitudes Toward Homosexuality—A Multilevel Analysis of 79 Countries

[Warren Stupidity]

Abstract



Although attitudes toward homosexuality have become more liberal, particularly in industrialized Western countries, there is still a great deal of variance in terms of worldwide levels of homonegativity. Using data from the two most recent waves of the World Values Survey (1999–2004, 2005–2009), this article seeks to explain this variance by means of a multilevel analysis of 79 countries. We include characteristics on the individual level, as age or gender, as well as aggregate variables linked to specificities of the nation-states. In particular, we focus on the religious denomination of a person and her religiosity to explain her attitude toward homosexuality. We find clear differences in levels of homonegativity among the followers of the individual religions.



For the purposes of this article, homonegativity should be understood as an aversion to homosexuality as a social practice or way of life. To measure this concept, we use a question of the WVS that asks whether homosexuality can be justified. This question can be answered on a scale of 1 to 10, where 1 means always justifiable and 10 stands for never justifiable. The map in Figure 1 shows not only the geographic variation but also a certain regional clustering of this indicator.




FIGURE 1 Homonegativity throughout the world. Map from http://www.aprsworld.net/gisdata/world/. Color classification according to the Jenks optimization method. Source. WVS Question 38.




Some studies identify a further aspect of homonegativity that involves the question to what extent a person exhibits a negative, biased attitude toward gays and lesbians as individuals (going as far as aggressive prejudices and feelings of hate). These works show that homonegativity understood as a way of life and homonegativity understood as attitudes against individuals are two only partly corroborative aspects of the same phenomenon—both in terms of the theoretical conception as well as the empirical manifestation (Ford, Brignall, VanValey, & Macaluso, 2009; Štulhofer & Rimac, 2009). Even though we primarily use the first definition of homonegativity as discussed above, we will still cross-check whether the alternative concept leads to divergent results. We capture this second aspect of homonegativity using the already-mentioned WVS question whether one dislikes a homosexual person as a neighbor (scale: 1 to 3)—an indicator that has been used in previous studies as well (Štulhofer & Rimac, 2009, p. 27).3 Correlating the country averages for these two operationalizations of homonegativity shows that, in spite of a strong correlation (r = 0.81**), there are certain disparities that justify the cross-check of our results.

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00918369.2014.969071#abstract

[Act_of_Reparation]

1. Doesn't matter. Pope Francis is changing things.

I read about it in the National Geographics.

[Warren Stupidity]

2. Easily dismissed by adding many new countries to the "won't visit list".

There is always a way out of accepting responsibility for the bigoted institutions one supports.

[Warren Stupidity]

4. Or the "singapore gambit".

[rug]

3. How do you explain China?