Article history: Received 31 May 2011 Received in revised form 15 July 2011 Accepted 13 August 2011 Available online 3 September 2011 High levels of religiosity have been linked to lower levels of intelligence in a number of recent studies. These results have generated both controversy and theoretical interest. Here in a large sample of US adults we address several issues that restricted the ge...

Recent research on the impact of religiosity on sexuality has highlighted the role of the individual, and suggests that the effects of religious group and sexual attitudes and fantasy may be mediated through individual differences in spirituality. The present study investigated the role of religion in an ethnically diverse young adult sample (N = 1413, 69% women) using religious group as well a...

This paper presents a theoretical framework to understand the relationship between religious fundamentalist communities and the Internet, through addressing four dimensions of tensions and challenges: hierarchy, patriarchy, discipline, and seclusion. We develop the concept of cultured technology, and analyze the ways communities reshape technology and make it as part of the ir culture, while on...

Empirical research on fundamentalist biographies—presented are three case studies and a summary of research results—demonstrate the complex biographical-motivational factors for fundamentalist turns, but also a transformational potential. Explaining fundamentalist conversion and deconversion within a theoretical framework of fundamentalism as “modern anti-modernism” and as “dislocation of relig...

This research assessed the correlates of homophobia and transphobia in heterosexual and homosexual individuals, based on a theory of different sources of perceived symbolic threat to social status. Compared to 310 heterosexual college students, a sample of 30 gay male and 30 lesbian college students scored lower on homophobia, transphobia, and religious fundamentalism. Mean gender differences w...

Given the increasing influence of religious fundamentalism on politics (e.g. the Christian right in the United States or the Muslim fundamentalism associated with Al Qaeda), the question of how we can conceive of law and order, or society itself, without employing repressive ideals becomes more urgent. We need a way of conceptualizing the origin and process of idealization (which is necessary f...

W e live in turbulent times. Our epoch is characterized by startling advances on the one hand and conditions of extreme socioeconomic retrogression and distress on the other. Social development is severely uneven and yet deeply intertwined. This has created unexpected convulsions which are exploding across the planet. Both a consequence and a cause of this turbulence is a resurgence of religion...

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