Social Science Research 38 (2009) 338351

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Social Science Research

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Shaping attitudes about homosexuality: The role of religion and cultural context q
Amy Adamczyk a,*, Cassady Pitt b
a b

Department of Sociology, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York, 899 10th Ave., New York, NY 10019, USA Department of Sociology, Wayne State University, 2228 Faculty Administration Building, Detroit MI 48201, USA

a r t i c l e

i n f o

a b s t r a c t
Across the globe, the debate over homosexuality continues, with great variation in public opinion about the acceptability of homosexuality, laws regulating same-sex unions and penalties for homosexual sex behaviors. Religion is often seen as an important predictor of attitudes about homosexuality. However, cross-national differences in cultural orientations suggest that the role religion has in explaining homosexual attitudes may depend on a nations cultural context. In this study, we merge ideas from cultural sociology and religious contextual effects to explain cross-national variation in public opinion about homosexuality. Using data from the fourth wave of the World Values Survey and Hierarchical Modeling techniques, we nd support for the micro and macro effects of religion and a survival vs. self-expressive cultural orientation. Moreover, we nd that personal religious beliefs have a greater effect on attitudes about homosexuality in countries like the United States, which have a strong self-expressive cultural orientation. Published by Elsevier Inc.

Article history: Available online 20 January 2009

Keywords: Religion Homosexuality Gay Lesbian Culture Attitudes Economic development Values Afliation Muslim Protestant Catholic

1. Introduction Around the world, public opinion about homosexuality varies considerably. While, for example, same-sex marriage is permitted in Canada, Belgium, and the Netherlands, homosexuality is illegal and gay marriage is unthinkable in most African nations. To understand why some countries have such strong penalties for homosexuality, we turn to the literature on public opinion and the role that culture and religion have in shaping it. Since public opinion is an important factor in developing laws and policies, understanding the source of these attitudes can shed light on why some nations have such liberal policies, and others continue to punish sexual behaviors like homosexuality. To date, very little research has been done to explain variation in attitudes about homosexuality in non-Western nations. Research done on the United States typically points to religion as one of the strongest predictors of attitudes about homosexuality (Olson et al., 2006; Schulte and Battle, 2004; Burdette, Ellison, and Hill 2005; Rowatt et al., 2006). But, because research has primarily been conducted in Christian nations, it is not clear how non-Judeo-Christian faiths shape public opinion about homosexuality. Additionally, work in cultural sociology (Inglehart and Baker, 2000; Inglehart, 2006; Inglehart et al., 2002) suggests that economic development and political stability may play a major role in shaping public opinion towards non-normative groups and behaviors, like homosexuality.
q Special thanks to Jacob Felson for his input on the paper. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 2008 John Jay College International Conference. * Corresponding author. E-mail address: aadamczyk@jjay.cuny.edu (A. Adamczyk).

0049-089X/$ - see front matter Published by Elsevier Inc. doi:10.1016/j.ssresearch.2009.01.002

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In this study, we combine ideas from cultural sociology (Inglehart and Baker, 2000; Inglehart, 2006; Inglehart et al., 2002) and the sociology of religions anti-ascetic hypothesis (Burkett and White, 1974; Tittle and Welch, 1983; Hadaway et al., 1984) to explain cross-national variation in public opinion about homosexuality. We argue that as nations value orientations shift in emphasis from survival to self-expression, most residents become more accepting of homosexuality. However, just as economic and political stability bring more tolerance for non-normative ideas and groups, they also present a greater opportunity for personal religious beliefs to direct attitudes. As a result, religion may have a greater effect on attitudes about homosexuality in developed countries like the United States, which are characterized by a high level of self-expression and a diversity of perspectives. To examine the micro and macro inuences of religion and culture on public opinion about homosexuality, we use hierarchical linear models and data from the fourth wave of the World Values Survey. 1.1. Religion and homosexuality Across the world, personal religious beliefs and afliation are typically seen as powerful predictors of attitudes about homosexuality. Most religions tend to categorize behaviors associated with homosexuality as unnatural, ungodly, and impure (Yip, 2005). Because of this framing, active religious involvement, regular exposure to religious literature, and frequent interaction with religious friends are likely to encourage anti-homosexual attitudes (Olson et al., 2006; Sherkat and Ellison, 1997; Scheitle and Adamczyk, 2009). Likewise, fear of divine punishment for individuals and the society in which they live may lead more religious people to encourage others to adopt anti-homosexual attitudes and institute policies that are consistent with intolerance (Wilcox, 1996; Regnerus and Smith, 1998). While religious people may have more disapproving attitudes than non-religious individuals, religions vary tremendously in the extent to which they systematically condemn homosexuality. In the United States, Judaism and mainline Protestant faiths are usually seen as the most liberal, followed by Catholicism. Relative to other religious groups in America, conservative Protestants are typically seen as having the least accepting attitudes (Burdette et al., 2005; Ellison and Musick, 1993; Beatty and Walter, 1984; Loftus, 2001; Reimer and Park, 2001; Wilcox and Jelen, 1990). With so few Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists in the United States and Europe, research on tolerance of homosexuality among non-Judeo-Christian groups has been minimal. In one of the few studies to include individual-level data on nonJudeo-Christian groups, Yuchtman-Yaar and Alkalay (2007) found that Muslims had more conservative social values than Catholics and Protestants. Likewise, Finke and Adamczyk (2008) found that Muslims had more conservative attitudes about sexual morality than Catholics. Given the importance of sexual morality in Muslim communities, we suspect that Muslims will have more disapproving views of homosexuality than people of other religious faiths. While studies conducted in United States and Europe have tended to focus on the inuence of personal religious beliefs and afliation for understanding attitudes about homosexuality, the religious culture of a nation may also shape attitudes. Research on religious contexts (Adamczyk, in press; Adamczyk and Felson, 2006; Moore and Vanneman, 2003) has suggested that even people who are not personally religious may be inuenced by the religious culture in which they live. Hence, Moore and Vanneman (2003) found that people living in a more religious region of the United States tended to have more conservative gender attitudes, even if they did not consider themselves personally religious. The existence of severe penalties, including death, for people found guilty of homosexual acts in many Muslim nations suggests that religious authorities in these countries may be particularly likely to interpret religious precepts as proscribing homosexuality (Helie, 2004). If the religious context is more disapproving of homosexuality in Muslim nations, then anti-homosexual sentiment may be disseminated through public discourse, public institutions, legal codes, social norms, and family structures. Since all people in a Muslim nation are exposed to the national religious culture, even people who are not personally religious may be less tolerant of homosexuality then residents of other countries. On the basis of these ideas we have developed three hypotheses on the micro and macro effects of religion on public opinion about homosexuality:  H1: More religious people will have more disapproving attitudes about homosexuality than less religious people.  H2: Muslims will have more disapproving attitudes about homosexuality than members of other religious groups.  H3: Individuals from Muslim-majority nations will have more disapproving attitudes about homosexuality than people residing in countries with fewer Muslims. 1.2. Survival vs. self-expressive cultural orientation Along with personal religiosity, religious afliation, and the national religious culture, the level of industrialization within a nation may also shape tolerance for non-conventional groups and ideas. In a study of 65 nations that represented 75% of the worlds population, Ronald Inglehart and his colleagues (Inglehart et al., 2002; Inglehart, 1990, 2006) examined the link between economic development and attitude change. They found that value orientations measured across countries could be collapsed into two principal factors of cultural life traditional vs. secular-rational and self-expression vs. survival. We focus on survival vs. self-expression for explaining cross-national attitudes about homosexuality. On the basis of their ndings from the World Values Survey, Inglehart and Baker (2000) explain that as nations undergo the process of industrialization and modernization, attitudes and values shift away from concerns about physical and

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economic security to world-views that are increasingly rational, tolerant, and trusting. Instead of worrying about how to fulll basic needs like food, shelter, and safety, people become increasingly interested in issues related to subjective well-being, quality of life, and self-expression (Inglehart, 1977). With this new orientation, people can more easily afford to tolerate new ideas and non-normative behaviors like homosexuality. Health and safety, which once may have been threatened by things that were unfamiliar, increasingly improve. Conversely, when a nation is regularly faced with political and economic uncertainty and insecurity, people are more likely to support values and norms that emphasize the familiar (Inglehart et al., 2002). As a result people in nations that are characterized by a strong survivalist orientation may be less tolerant of nontraditional ideas and lifestyles. Researchers (Inglehart and Baker, 2000; Inglehart, 2006; Inglehart et al., 2002) have found that a greater emphasis on selfexpression is associated with more tolerance towards prostitution, gender equality, and the acceptance of foreigners. However, these relationships have largely been tested with aggregated nation-level data (for the exception see Yuchtman-Yaar and Alkalay, 2007), making it difcult to determine whether individuals attitudes are shaped by the larger cultural context (Haller, 2002). To our knowledge this will be the rst study to employ this cultural perspective and measures of a nations self-expressive vs. survivalist orientation to explain individuals attitudes about homosexuality. We hypothesize the following:  H4: Individuals who reside in nations characterized by a survival orientation will have more disapproving attitudes towards homosexuality than people in nations characterized by self-expression. Contrary to the perspective of sociologys forefathers, contemporary research in the sociology of religion (Finke and Stark, 1992; Stark and Finke, 2000) suggests that industrialization and development do not necessarily cause people to become less religious. Rather, the religious tradition of a nation and personal religious beliefs continue to inuence attitudes and behaviors in developed countries. As we argue below, there is reason to think that as nations develop and orientations begin to shift from survival to self-expression, personal religious beliefs may actually be more likely to inuence attitudes about homosexuality. 1.3. Religion and cultural orientation In a nation that is characterized by a strong survivalist orientation, all residents may be less likely to tolerate attitudes and behaviors that deviate from the norm. As a result, we would expect that a nations laws and policies would reect this intolerance. Indeed, as shown in Fig. 1, 26% (5 out of 19) of the countries that have a stronger survival orientation (greater than the mean) have laws against homosexuality, as opposed to 14% (2 out of 14) of the countries that have a stronger self-expressive orientation (less than the mean). Likewise, 37% of the countries that have a stronger survival orientation have laws that protect against same-sex discrimination, as opposed to 71% of the countries that have a stronger self-expressive orientation. While religious leaders from nations characterized by a stronger survival orientation are more likely to oppose homosexuality, they will be one of many sources disapproving of homosexuality. A number of studies conducted in the United States have found that personal religiosity tends to have a greater effect on attitudes and behaviors that are characterized by normative ambiguity, rather than attitudes and behaviors (e.g. stealing), which are universally condemned (Burkett and White, 1974; Tittle and Welch, 1983; Hadaway et al., 1984). On the basis of these ideas the anti-ascetic hypothesis has emerged and argues that religions effect depends on whether the behavior being examined has wide-spread support. While all members of a nation are held accountable for actions that are universally sanctioned, personal religious beliefs are more likely to serve as a guide for attitudes where there are not clear social sanctions or universal agreement about their detrimental social costs (Finke and Adamczyk, 2008). Applying these ideas to cross-national attitudes about homosexuality, we would hypothesize that in countries which are characterized by a strong self-expression orientation (e.g. the United States) personal religious beliefs may have a greater effect on disapproving attitudes about homosexuality because religion is one of the few authorities to offer clear directives on homosexuality. Hence, in countries characterized by a high level of self-expression, people who are religious should be more likely to have attitudes that are consistent with religious proscriptions about homosexuality. Conversely, while the majority of people in a nation characterized by a culture of survival may disapprove of homosexuality, personal religious beliefs should have less of an effect because religion will be one of many authorities disapproving of homosexuality. These ideas lead to our nal hypothesis:  H5: Personal religiosity will have a greater inuence on attitudes about homosexuality in nations characterized by a selfexpressive culture than in nations characterized by a survivalist culture.

2. Data and methodology To examine the macro and micro-level effects of religion and culture we use data from the fourth wave of the World Values Surveys (Inglehart, 2004). The WVS was designed to enable a cross-national comparison of values and norms on a wide variety of topics and to monitor changes in values and attitudes across the globe (Inglehart and Baker, 2000). The sample

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Classification of WVS Countries (4th Wave) according to Survival vs. Self-Expression1 and Laws Related to Homosexuality (Scale ranges from 0.6=high survival to -0.8=high self-expression, where 0=mean)
Higher survival, lower self-expression (scale>0) (Country N=19) Tanzania Singapore Macedonia Bangladesh Algeria Pakistan Montenegro Indonesia Uganda Albania Kyrgyz Republic Jordan Zimbabwe South Africa Egypt Bosnia Serbia Philippines Moldova Higher self-expression, lower survival (scale<0) (Country N=14) Nigeria India

Laws against homosexuality

No laws against homosexuality or laws protecting against same sex discrimination

Vietnam South Korea

Laws protecting against same sex discrimination

Canada USA Japan Puerto Rico Mexico Venezuela Spain Argentina Peru Chile

Fig. 1. 1Information on how the country survival vs. self-expression measure was created and laws were coded can be found in the data and methodology section of this paper.

includes adults 18 and over from 40 societies resulting in a total of 60,047 cases.1 After we excluded countries in the WVS that did not have information on key variables our sample size was reduced to 45,824 and included 33 nations,2 which are listed in Fig. 1. Table 1 presents descriptive statistics for all variables included in the analysis. 2.1. Dependent variable Our key outcome variable is disapproval of homosexuality,3 which is measured using a single question that asks whether homosexuality can always be justied, never be justied, or something in between. Responses ranged from always wrong = 1 to always right = 10. The variable was reverse coded so that higher numbers indicate more disapproval. 2.2. Individual-level variables The index of survival vs. self-expression values is taken from Inglehart (2006) and colleagues work (Inglehart and Baker, 2000) on comparative cultural sociology. Aggregating several waves of the World Values Surveys that captured data from 65 nations, Inglehart found that value orientations measured across countries could be collapsed into two principal factors or dimensions of cultural life: self-expression vs. survival and traditional vs. secular-rational. This study is primarily interested in
Researchers used national random and quota sampling and collected the data using face-to-face interviews. The following countries could not be included in our analytic sample because their country/territory survey did not include the question about homosexuality acceptability, the questions used to create the survivalist cultural index, or the key religion variables: China, Turkey, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Iran, and Iraq. Since it would be inappropriate to impute values that are not missing at random (Allison, 2001), we, unfortunately, had to delete these countries. 3 We considered dichotomizing our measure of homosexuality disapproval because the variable was skewed to the upper end of the range. However, in preliminary analysis we had trouble getting our model to converge, particularly when we tested the cross-level interaction between religious importance and country survivalist culture.
2 1

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Table 1 Descriptive statistics for variables included in the analysis. Individual N = 45,824; country N = 33. Mean Individual-level variables Homosexuality not justied Individual self-expression vs. survival values Married Number of children Education Female Financial satisfaction Birth cohort: Before 1920 19201929 19301939 19401949 19501959 19601969 19701979 >1980 Religious importance Religious afliation: No religion Catholic Protestant Orthodox Jewish Hindu Buddhist Other religion All Else Muslim Country-level variables Country mean of self-expressionism vs. survival values Country cultural/religious tradition Catholic Protestant Muslim Orthodox Hindu Buddhist Homosexuality regulation
a

SDa 2.61 0.56 0.49 1.99 2.45 0.5 2.72 0.04 0.14 0.24 0.3 0.36 0.41 0.44 0.4 0.92 0.34 0.42 0.34 0.28 0.06 0.2 0.16 0.21 0.2 0.44 0.25 0.47 0.33 0.49 0.33 0.17 0.24 0.81

Minimum 1 1.63 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.65 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Maximum 10 1.39 1 8 9 1 10 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 4 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 0.41 1 1 1 1 1 1 2

8.51 0.02 0.58 2.08 5.23 0.51 5.39 <0.01 0.02 0.06 0.1 0.15 0.22 0.26 0.2 3.36 0.14 0.22 0.14 0.08 0 0.04 0.03 0.05 0.04 0.26 0 0.3 0.12 0.36 0.12 0.03 0.06 0.70

Standard deviation.

self-expression vs. survival, which we recreate in this study by adding together four standardized measures4 of the variables used in Inglehart and Bakers (2000) index.5 The items are: giving priority to economic security over self-expression6 (ranges from 1 to 4), respondent describes self as not very happy (ranges from 1 to 4), respondent would under no circumstances sign a petition (ranges from 1 to 3), and you have to be very careful about trusting people (ranges from 0 to 1). Before being averaged together, all responses were centered so they had a mean of zero and a standard deviation of 1. Higher numbers indicate a stronger survival orientation and less of a self-expression orientation. Inglehart and Bakers (2000) survival vs. self-expression index is highly correlated with a larger eleven item index, r = 0.96. Our key indicator of personal religiosity is religious importance, which is measured with a single question that asks respondents to indicate how important religion is in their life. Responses were reverse coded so that the highest category, 4, indicates very important and the lowest category, 1, indicates not at all important. We also considered including a measure of religious attendance. We chose not to because religions (e.g. Christianity vs. Buddhism) vary in the extent to which religious atten-

4 The one variable that is missing from our index, but was included in Inglehart and Bakers (2000) index was a measure of whether the respondent felt that homosexuality was justied. Since this question is used as our key dependent variable, we could not also include it as a predictor. A high correlation (r = 0.91) between the index we created and an index that uses all ve of the variables that Inglehart used suggests that both indices are measuring very similar things. 5 In preliminary HLM analysis we used factor scores to create the survival vs. self-expression index and got very similar results to the ones presented in this paper. Likewise, we also tried dichotomizing all of the measures included in the index, and adding them together. Again, with this measure we got very similar results to the ones presented in this paper. We chose to use the index that combined the standardized measures (i.e. mean of zero and standard deviation of one) because it allowed us to maintain a high level of variation, could be easily replicated, and was more straight-forward than combing the factors scores. 6 This measure was derived from a question that asked, If you had to choose, which one of the things on this card would you say is most important? And which would be the next most important? Respondents who chose giving people more say and protecting freedom of speech were coded 1. Respondents who chose maintaining order in the nation and ghting rising prices were coded as 4. The remaining respondents were coded as either 2 or 3 depending on whether they put one of the post-materialist responses before or after the materialist response.

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dance would indicate religious commitment and/or exposure to religious doctrine. Additionally, we were concerned about over-specifying our models by including both religious attendance and religious importance, which are moderately correlated. Religious afliation is measured with a series of binary variables: Buddhist, Catholic, Hindu, Jewish, Orthodox, Protestant, Other religion, no religious afliation, and all else, which includes people who were not asked about their religious afliation, did not know their afliation or for whom the question was not applicable. Islam is used as the reference category. We include several other control variables that previous research has found to be associated with either religion or attitudes about homosexuality (Kulik, 2005; Scheepers, et al., 2002; Finke and Adamczyk, 2008; Ohlander et al., 2005). Marriage is measured as a binary variable where 1 = married and 0 = all others. Respondents were also asked how many children they had. Education is taken from a question that asks respondents, What is the highest educational level that you have attained? Response categories range from 1 = no formal education to 9 = university with degree. Gender is measured as a binary variable where female = 1 and male = 0. Financial satisfaction is measured with a single question that asks respondents to rank on a ten-point scale how satised they are with the nancial situation of their household. Higher numbers indicate more satisfaction. Finally, we were interested in whether changes in attitudes about homosexuality were the result of cohort replacement (Alwin and Krosnick, 1991) or period effects (Treas, 2002; Anderson and Fetner, 2008). To evaluate the evidence responsible for changes in attitudes about homosexuality, we would need data collected at more than one time period. While multiple waves of the WVS are available, our preliminary analysis showed that limiting our sample to only countries that included key measures for three different waves (e.g. 1990, 1995, and 2000)7 eliminated several less developed countries (i.e. Albania, Algeria, Egypt, Jordan, Kyrgyz Republic, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Pakistan, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zimbabwe) substantially reducing variation on key variables. Moreover, a power analysis using Optimal Design Software (2006) showed that for the 23 available countries, the power to detect signicant country-level effects would be quite weak. Nevertheless, conceptually, we wanted to account for the idea that change in attitudes within countries is likely due to either cohort replacement or period effects. Hence, rather than a linear measure of age, we include seven dummy variables indicating the decade in which the respondent was born. People born before 1920 (i.e. age 8597), which is our oldest cohort, is the comparison group. 2.3. Country-level variables8 Our key country-level indicator is the mean level of self-expression vs. survival values in each of the 33 nations included in our study. This measure was created by aggregating the individual-level survival vs. self-expressive index measure to the country level.9 We also include ve binary variables that measure the principal religious tradition of the country where the respondent lives. These religious traditions are Catholic (Canada, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Venezuela, Spain, Argentina, Peru, Chile, Uganda, and The Philippines), Hindu (India), Orthodox Christian (Moldova, Serbia, Montenegro, and Macedonia), Protestant (USA, South Korea, South Africa, and Zimbabwe), and Buddhist (Japan and Vietnam), where Islam (Nigeria, Egypt, Tanzania, Indonesia, Singapore10, Bosnia, Bangladesh, Algeria Albania, Kyrgyz Republic, Jordan, and Pakistan) is the reference category. Since attitudes about homosexuality may be partially shaped by government regulation regarding homosexuality, we include a measure of homosexuality regulation. Our homosexuality regulation measure is a sum of two variables11 that indicate whether a nation legally permits homosexuality,12 and whether it has laws that protect against same-sex discrimination.13 Whereas 0 indicates that same-sex unions are permitted and there are laws protecting against same-sex discrimination, a 1 indicates that there are no laws protecting against same-sex discrimination, and a 2 indicates that there are penalties for homosexuality.

7 We considered these three waves from the WVS integrated le because they all had measures of the key variables. The 1980 survey wave from the integrated le did not include a measure of religious importance. 8 We wanted to include additional country-level control variables, but with only 33 countries we were concerned about losing degrees of freedom to adequately test our key variables. In a separate analysis we found that country logged population was not signicant when entered with only the individuallevel variables. However, the United Nations education index was associated with attitudes about homosexuality when entered with only the individual-level variables. We then included it in our analysis with the other country-level variables (i.e. Table 4, Model 6) and found that it was no longer signicant (p < .05) and none of the other country-level variables, including the self-expression vs. survival index, changed in signicance or direction. 9 To assess the value shift that accompanies changes in a nations level of development we considered using GDP instead of the survival vs. self-expression index. The two measures are highly correlated (r = 0.70). However, we were concerned that GDP would capture additional shifts in values, including a traditional vs. secular-rational orientation, which was also associated with GDP in Inglehart and Bakers (2000) analysis. Since we were particularly interested in whether a cultural values shift would moderate the effect of religion on attitudes about homosexuality, we chose to use the more direct measure of survival vs. self-expression, while working with the understanding that economic development is predictive of a shift from a survival to a self-expression orientation. 10 Because Singapore has similar proportions of Muslims and Christians, it was difcult to classify into one of the religious traditions used. According to the World Christian Database, there were slightly more Muslims than Christians in 2000 so we chose to classify the nation as Muslim. 11 Answers.com had the most complete information that we could nd on international laws regulating same-sex relations. We used the entry, Homosexuality laws of the world, which was taken from Wikipedia, a user-contributed encyclopedia. We were able to verify their data with other sources including, the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission. Homosexuality laws of the world, can be found at the following website: http:// www.answers.com/main/ntquery;jsessionid=2g5317irk088c?method=4&dsid=2222&dekey=Homosexuality+laws+of+the+ world&gwp=8&curtab=2222_1&sbid=lc03b&linktext= Homosexuality%20laws. 12 If a country only regulated against male same-sex relations, we coded the country as not allowing same-sex unions. 13 If a country had legislation under consideration, we coded them as having laws that protected against same sex discrimination. The website did not make clear when the data was compiled and if it was regularly updated. We chose to code legislation under consideration as having laws against discrimination because with this measure we were trying to assess the governments stance on the issue and how any laws/regulation might shape attitudes. A government that was considering including laws that did not discriminate would have friendlier policies than others.

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2.4. Statistical methods To assess country and individual effects on attitudes about homosexuality, we use generalized mixed models (Breslow and Clayton, 1993) and the HLM software program developed by Raudenbush et al. (2005). Hierarchical modeling techniques allow us to discern variation within nations (micro-level effects) from variation between nations (macro-level effects). Standard OLS regression assumes that errors are independent of each other. However, when respondents are clustered within countries, residents of the same nation are more likely to be similar to their fellow countrymen than residents of different nations, which would violate the standard OLS assumption of independent errors. Hierarchical modeling techniques account for correlated errors within the same nation and use the appropriate degrees of freedom for country units. Below we explain how our analysis will proceed. We start by examining correlations between key predictors and the outcome variable. We then estimate HLM models to assess the contribution of individual-level variables for attitudes about homosexuality. The individual-level model provides the average estimate of individual attitudes net of individual characteristics, and standard errors that account for the increased similarity between individuals within the same country. Formally, the model for examining attitudes about homosexuality with all of the individual-level measures is:

Y ij b0j b1 religious importance b2 individual self-expression vs: survival values b3 married b4 children b5 education b6 Age b7 female b8 financial satisfaction b9 femaleb1018 religious affiliation r ij :
The i indexes individuals and j indexes country-level inuences. The distribution of rij is assumed to be random normal with a mean of 0 and variance of r2. To explore the effect of national context on attitudes about homosexuality, we then model the effects of country-level variables on the intercept from the previous model. Formally the model for the intercept is:

b0j c00 c015 dominant cultural=religious tradition c06 country mean self-expression vs: survival values c07 policies=laws discriminating against homosexuality uoj :
In this model, j indexes country-level inuences, b0j is the intercept term from the individual-level equation (representing individual attitudes about homosexuality adjusted for individual attributes), and uoj is a country-level disturbance assumed to be normally distributed with a mean of 0 and variance of t00. At this point in the analysis we are primarily interested in how the individual and country-level variables directly inuence disapproval of homosexuality, without assessing whether the relationship between religious importance and attitudes about homosexuality varies by country. In our nal models we examine whether the country self-expression vs. survival country index explains variation in the relationship between personal religiosity and disapproval of homosexuality. We rst assess whether the relationship between personal religiosity and disapproval of homosexuality varies signicantly across countries, which would warrant the testing of a cross-level interaction.14 If there is signicant variation across countries, we will then include a cross-level interaction term to test whether the country-level self-expression vs. survival cultural index signicantly changes the strength of the relationship between personal religiosity and disapproval of homosexuality. Formally, the model for this relationship is:

b1j c10 c11 country-level religiosity u1j :

where b1j is the personal religious importance coefcient for people in country j. U1j refers to a country specic disturbance in the association between the country self-expression vs. survival values and personal religious importance that is assumed to be normally distributed with a mean of 0 and variance of t11. To maintain the largest sample size possible, we handle missing data with multiple imputation techniques, which take full advantage of the available data and avoid some of the bias in standard errors and test statistics that can accompany listwise deletion (Allison, 2001).15 Missing values are imputed for ve datasets and the parameter estimates are averages of regression coefcients produced through the imputation option in the statistical computing program, Hierarchical Linear and Nonlinear Modeling (Raudenbush et al., 2005). Standard errors from the multiple imputation process are calculated to reect the uncertainty that is generated through simulated data. Our nal individual-level sample size consists of 45,824 respondents.

14 When we test whether there is signicant variation in the slope of religious importance, the rst part of the model changes to the following:Yij = b0j + b1j (Religious importance) + b2 (Individualself-expression vs. survival values) + b3 (Married) + b4 (Children) + b5 (Education) + b6 (Age) + b7 (Female) + b8 (Financial satisfaction) + b9 (Female) b1018 (Religious Afliation) + rij. The formula for the country intercept does not change. 15 For respondents who had at least one non-missing value on any of the variables in the analysis, missing data was imputed using the procedure written by Royston (2004) based on a technique outlined in van Buuren et al. (1999).

A. Adamczyk, C. Pitt / Social Science Research 38 (2009) 338351 Table 2 Correlations between major variables of interest. Unit of analysis Individual Individual Individual Country Country
*

345

Variables Homosexuality disapproval Religious importance Muslim afliation Self-expression vs. survival Muslim-majority Country

Homosexuality disapproval 1 0.25* 0.29* 0.38* 0.35*

Religious importance 1 0.26* 0.23* 0.27*

Muslim afliation

Self-expression vs. survival

1 0.30* 0.63*

1 0.42*

<.05.

Aside from dummy variables, all variables in the analysis are centered (mean = 0), which means that the intercept term represents the average attitude about homosexuality for people who are assigned the suppressed category for all dummy variables and the average value on all other variables. To appropriately analyze the data as a nationally representative sample, we use the recommended weights, which account for the unequal probability of selection of persons within nations. 3. Results Table 2 presents correlations between attitudes about homosexuality and key indicator variables. The largest correlation for attitudes about homosexuality is the country survival vs. self-expression index (r = 0.38), which is followed by living in a Muslim-majority country (r = 0.35), and then Muslim afliation (r = 0.29) and religious importance (r = 0.25). Individual religious importance is moderately correlated with the country survival vs. self-expression index (r = 0.23), Muslim afliation (r = 0.26), and living in a Muslim-majority country (r = 0.27). Not surprisingly, Muslim afliates are more likely to be living in a Muslim-majority nation (r = 0.63).

Table 3 Individual-level effects for explaining disapproval of homosexuality. Individual N = 45,824; country N = 33. Model 1 Coefcient Intercept Individual self-expression vs. survival values Married Number of children Education Female Financial satisfaction Birth cohorta 19201929 19301939 19401949 19501959 19601969 19701979 >1980 Religious importance Religious afliationb No religion Catholic Protestant Orthodox Jewish Hindu Buddhist Other religion All else Individual variance Country variance <.10. <.05. <.01. *** <.001. a The reference group is people born before 1920. b Muslim is the reference category.
* ** +

Model 2 SE 0.393 0.105 .065 .013 .020 .053 .009 .333 .413 .440 .455 .453 .451 .435 Coefcient 9.688*** .315** .227*** .001 .054** .285*** .004 .292 .755* .929* 1.122** 1.183** 1.250** 1.319*** 0.346*** SE .377 .106 .062 .012 .019 .065 .009 .319 .390 .412 .418 .416 .412 .397 0.058

Model 3 Coefcient 9.895*** .321** .215*** .000 .050** .292*** .004 .227 .709+ .883* 1.071** 1.129** 1.202** 1.282*** .289*** .548*** .430** .053 .245+ 1.168* .243 .200 .075 .781** SE .347 .106 .060 .012 .019 .065 .009 .303 .371 .393 .398 .394 .390 .375 .053 .134 .136 .118 .129 .477 .155 .186 .137 .248

9.720*** .307** .243*** .004 .061** .228*** .002 .324 .801* 1.001* 1.213** 1.278** 1.356** 1.432***

4.76 1.876***

4.689 1.673***

4.655 1.511***

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Table 4 Country-level effects and cross-level interaction between religious importance and country survival index for explaining disapproval of homosexuality. Individual N = 45,824; Country N = 33. Model 4 Coefcient Intercept Individual-level variables Individual self-expression vs. survival values Married Number of children Education Female Financial Satisfaction Birth cohortb 19201929 19301939 19401949 19501959 19601969 19701979 >1980 Religious afliationc No religion Catholic Protestant Orthodox Jewish Hindu Buddhist Other religion All Else Religious importance Countrylevel variables Country cultural/religious traditiona Catholic Protestant Orthodox Hindu Buddhist Country mean of self-expression vs. survival values Policies/laws discriminating against Homosexuality Cross-level interaction Religious importance country survival index Individual variance Country variance Religious importance slope variance
+ *

Model 5 SE .391 .060 .027 .007 .005 .021 .004 .286 .277 .279 .275 .275 .275 .274 .048 .048 .048 .064 .174 .096 .079 .059 .104 .015 Coefcient 10.473
***

Model 6 SE .380 .060 .027 .008 .005 .021 .005 .286 .277 .279 .275 .275 .276 .274 .048 .048 .048 .064 .174 .096 .079 .059 .104 .015 Coefcient 10.223
***

Model 7 SE .403 .060 .027 .007 .005 .021 .004 .286 .277 .279 .274 .275 .275 .274 .048 .048 .048 .064 .174 .096 .079 .060 .104 .015 Coefcient 10.192
***

Model 8 SE .372 .059 .027 .007 .005 .021 .004 .286 .276 .278 .275 .275 .276 .274 .048 .048 .048 .064 .174 .095 .078 .059 .103 .050 Coefcient 10.196
***

SE .354 .059 .027 .007 .005 .021 .004 .286 .276 .278 .274 .275 .275 .274 .048 .048 .048 .064 .174 .095 .078 .059 .103 .036

10.776

***

.321** .214*** .000 .050*** .292*** .004 .227 .709* .883** 1.071*** 1.129*** 1.201*** 1.282*** .531*** .420*** .060 .246*** 1.163*** .238** .195** .082 .779*** .289***

.319*** .214*** .000 .050*** .292*** .004 .227 .710** .883** 1.071*** 1.129*** 1.202*** 1.283*** .532*** .421*** .060 .247*** 1.162*** .238** .195** .081 .779*** .289***

.319*** .214*** .000 .050*** .292*** .003 .227 .709** .883** 1.071*** 1.129*** 1.203*** 1.283*** .532*** .422*** .059 .247*** 1.163*** .239** .197** .080 .782*** .289***

.315*** .207*** .000 .051*** .299*** .004 .170 .625* .787** .958*** 1.017*** 1.086*** 1.167*** .506*** .465*** .000 .250*** 1.113*** .247** .188** .028 .767*** .217***

.315*** .207*** .000 .052*** .299*** .003 .166 .620* .784** .954*** 1.013*** 1.081*** 1.163*** .507*** .468*** .003 .251*** 1.114*** .249** .200** .025 .772*** .216***

1.943*** 1.333* 0.334 1.367 0.881

0.420 0.563 0.565 1.023 0.748

1.339*** 0.817 0.467 1.033 0.180 2.317***

0.42 0.52 0.50 0.91 0.74 0.77

.853+ .501 .043 1.378 .426 2.024*** .456

.497 .540 .570 .900 .733 .764 .271

.842* .194 .341 1.571** 1.060+ .995+ .344

.345 .364 .393 .557 .585 .508 .187

.853* .199 .359 1.596** 1.074+ 1.522* .341+ .789***

.339 .357 .386 .544 .578 0.68 .183 .142

4.654 0.949***

4.655 0.729***

4.656 0.682***

4.612 1.086*** 0.071***

4.612 0.701*** 0.032***

<.10. <.05. ** <.01. *** <.00. a The reference group is the cohort of people born before 1920. b Muslim is the reference category. c Muslim-majority country is the reference category.

Tables 3 and 4 present the multivariate analysis of the relationship between the individual and country level variables for attitudes about homosexuality. In a separate analysis we found that 71% of the variance in attitudes about homosexuality is within nations and 29% of the variation is between nations.16 Compared to other outcomes modeled with hierarchical models, 29% is quite high, suggesting that a much higher-than-average share of attitudes about homosexuality is shaped by the country context. Model 1 of Table 4 presents the inuence of the individual-level control variables on attitudes about the acceptability of homosexuality. People in older cohorts are more likely to disapprove of homosexuality than people in younger cohorts.
16 The total variance is determined using the formula: Var (u0j + rij) = s00 + r2, where the r 2 parameter represents the within-group variability, and s 00 captures the between-group variability. Using this information, the proportion variance at each level can also be derived.

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Females appear to have more liberal attitudes about homosexuality than men. Likewise, married individuals are more likely to disapprove of homosexuality than single or divorced people. Also, increases in educational attainment are associated with more approving attitudes about homosexuality. At the individual-level, a greater emphasis on survival, as opposed to selfexpressive values, is associated with more disapproving attitudes about homosexuality. The second model in Table 3 introduces religious importance. Not surprisingly, individuals who say that they nd religion important are more likely to disapprove of homosexuality, which offers support for our rst hypothesis. Model 3 includes religious afliation. Compared to Muslims, people with no religion, Catholics, Jews, people who did not identify a religion, and individuals for whom we did not have appropriate information to categorize them have more approving attitudes about homosexuality, which offers some support for our second hypothesis. Somewhat surprising, Muslims do not differ signicantly in their disapproval of homosexuality from Protestants, Hindus, Buddhists, Orthodox Christians and people who afliate with a religion that is not mentioned here. However, we will revisit this relationship when the dominant religion is included in a later model (i.e. Table 4, Model 4). While the coefcient for religious importance in Model 3 decreases when religious afliation is included, it remains signicant. The individual-level variables included in Model 3 are explaining 10% of the overall variance in attitudes about homosexuality. In Table 4, Model 4 we include the dominant religion of the country where the respondent resides. Compared to people living in Muslim-majority nations, people who live in Catholic and Protestant majority countries have more approving attitudes towards homosexuality, regardless of the religion with which they personally afliate. There is no signicant difference in attitudes about homosexuality for people who live in a Christian Orthodox, Hindu, or Buddhist as opposed to a Muslim nation. In a separate analysis we switched the reference category and found no other signicant differences between the dominant religious groups. When the dominant religion is included, individuals who afliate as Hindu, Buddhist, or Orthodox Christians join Catholics, Jews, and people with no religion in having more accepting attitudes about homosexuality than Muslims. This nding offers more support for our second hypothesis that Muslims will have more disapproving attitudes regarding homosexuality than other religious afliates. This model shows that Protestants are the only religious group that does not have more accepting attitudes than Muslims. Switching the reference category, we also found that Protestants had more disapproving attitudes than Catholics, Orthodox Christians, Jews, and people with no religion. By including the national religion variables, we are explaining an additional 37% of the country-level variance found in attitudes about homosexuality. Model 5 includes the national survival vs. self-expression index, which is signicant. Individuals who reside in nations where there is a stronger survival orientation are more likely to disapprove of homosexuality. Conversely, people who live in countries that have a stronger self-expressive orientation have more approving attitudes, which provides support for our fourth hypothesis. When the national survival vs. self-expression index is included, the coefcient for the effect of residence in a Protestant nation is reduced by 39% and there are no longer any statistically signicant differences between people living in Protestant vs. Muslim nations. In a separate analysis, we found that all but one of the Muslim countries (i.e. Nigeria) had a score above the mean on the self-expression vs. survival index, indicating that almost all of the Muslims nations had a stronger survival orientation. Hence, differences that had appeared between Muslim and Protestant nations in attitudes about homosexuality in Model 4 were due to higher country levels of survivalism in Muslim countries. The inclusion of the survival vs. self-expressive country level index explains an additional 23% of the country variance in attitudes about homosexuality. In Model 6 we test whether national policies and laws regulating homosexuality inuence public opinion about homosexuality. There is no signicant relationship between national policies/laws discriminating against homosexuality and individuals attitudes about homosexuality. In Models 7 and 8 we test whether the country survivalist culture explains variation in the relationship between personal religiosity and disapproval of homosexuality. In Model 7 we allow the slope of religious importance to vary across countries, and nd that the variance component for the slope of religious importance is signicant. This warrants testing for an effect of the country survivalist culture on the relationship between personal religiosity and disapproval of homosexuality. In Model 8 we include the cross-level interaction term between the country self-expression vs. survival culture and personal religiosity, which is signicant. In countries with a higher survival orientation, personal religiosity has less of an effect on disapproving attitudes about homosexuality. In Fig. 2, we present predicted values for the effect of personal religiosity on disapproving attitudes about homosexuality for three different levels of the country survival vs. self-expression index. In nations characterized by a strong survival orientation (e.g. 1 SD above the mean), public opinion about homosexuality is highly disapproving, regardless of the individuals personal religious belief. Specically, women in a nation characterized by a strong survival orientation have a predicted value of 9.4 (on a scale of 010) for attitudes about homosexuality, regardless of personal religious importance. However, in nations that have a stronger self-expressive orientation (e.g. 1 SD below the mean), individual religious beliefs have a stronger effect on disapproving attitudes. Hence, in countries that have a strong self-expressive orientation, women who say religion is important have a predicted value of 9.0 on the homosexuality attitudes indicator, and women who report that religion is not important have a lower predicted value of 8.2. To assess the relative magnitude of signicant variables in Model 8 for explaining cross-national attitudes about homosexuality, we calculated standardized coefcients.17 The variable with the largest Beta (e.g. 0.24) is the interaction between
17 The formula for computing Betas (i.e. standardized coefcients) is: Betaxy = (bxy Sx)/Sy where Beta is the standardized coefcient, S is the standard deviation, and b is the unstandardized coefcient. We do not include individual religiosity or the country self-expression vs. survival index in our list of standardized coefcients because these variables are included in the interaction term, making it difcult to determine the variables individual contributions.

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9.6 Homosexuality Justification (10=never justified) 9.4 9.2 9 8.8 8.6 8.4 8.2 8 7.8 7.6 High country survival, low country self-expression Mean Low country survival, high country self-expression High individual religious importance Mean individual religious importance Low individual religious importance

Country survival vs. self-expression

Fig. 2. Predicted values of attitudes about homosexuality for three different levels of country survival vs. self-expression by individual religious importance. Predicted values are presented for Protestant afliated married women in their 40s living in Protestant majority countries where they have been assigned the mean on all other variables included in Table 4, Model 8.

religious importance and the country self-expression vs. survival index, followed by the two youngest age cohorts. With a Beta of 0.15, the country Catholic variable comes next, and in decreasing importance: the 1960 and 1950 cohorts, Hindu country variable, individual Catholic variable, 1940s cohort, the individual self-expression vs. survival index, no religion, all else, female, education, married, the 1930s cohort, and the remaining individual religious denomination categories. 4. Discussion and conclusion This study is the rst to systematically explore the inuence of a survival vs. self-expressive cultural orientation on attitudes about homosexuality. Research by Inglehart and colleagues (Inglehart et al., 2002; Inglehart, 1990, 2006) found a link between economic development and attitude change. Consistent with these ndings, we found that as societies shift their emphasis from survival to self-expression, attitudes about homosexuality become more accepting. We then examined this idea in conjunction with the anti-ascetic hypothesis, which argues that religions inuence depends on whether the behavior being examined has wide-spread support (Tittle and Welch, 1983; Hadaway, et al., 1984; Finke and Adamczyk, 2008). In countries that have a stronger survivalist orientation, religiously inspired attitudes about homosexuality are likely to be consistent with secular norms and laws, giving attitudes about homosexuality wide-spread support. As a result, personal religiosity in countries characterized by a stronger survival orientation does not have much of an effect on attitudes about homosexuality. However, as our ndings show, when the cultural emphasis within countries shifts to self-expression, secular norms and laws regarding homosexuality become more liberal, providing a greater role for religion to inuence attitudes about homosexuality. Hence, personal religious beliefs have a greater effect on attitudes about homosexuality in developed countries like the United States, which are characterized by a high level of self-expression and a diversity of perspectives, than in countries like Zimbabwe, which have a stronger survival orientation. These ndings suggest that we may need to reorient our thinking about the relationship between religion, and tolerance for unfamiliar groups. Economic and political stability is likely to make all people within a nation more tolerant of nonnormative groups and ideas. However, as economic and political stability contributes to a self-expressive value orientation, religious attitudes may not become more liberal. Rather than religion having less of an inuence on attitudes as nations develop, shifts from survival to self-expression are likely to provide a greater role for religion to inuence attitudes. This study can help explain why religious beliefs in countries like the United States continue to have an important effect on peoples moral attitudes, even as the larger culture becomes more liberal. Likewise, this study offers some insight into what we might expect as countries further industrialize and develop namely increasing tolerance for homosexuality, but also a stronger relationship between religious beliefs and disapproval of homosexuality. We were not able to isolate whether shifts in attitudes about homosexuality are the result of cohort replacement or period effects. With cohort replacement or generational effects, attitudinal change is seen as the result of younger and more

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tolerant generations replacing older and more conservative generations (Inglehart, 1977). With this perspective peoples attitudes are seen as changing little once they have developed (Alwin and Krosnick, 1991). In contrast to cohort replacement, research on period effects suggests that when there is rapid cultural, legal, and political changes surrounding a particular issue, attitudes within cohorts may change (Anderson and Fetner, 2008; Treas, 2002). It is likely that countries differ in whether cohort replacement or period effects are responsible for more liberal attitudes about homosexuality. Over the last thirty years in the United States and Canada lesbian and gay people have received more media exposure, homosexual subcultures have expanded, and there have been well-publicized changes to marriage laws and civil rights. As a result, all age cohorts within North America have developed more liberal attitudes towards homosexuality (Anderson and Fetner, 2008). However, countries like Armenia have not experienced the same rapid cultural, political, or legal changes related to homosexuality. For these countries, changes in attitudes about homosexuality are more likely to result from younger more liberal generations replacing older more conservative ones. In addition to our key nding that a countrys cultural orientation moderates the relationship between religious importance and homosexual attitudes, we also found some interesting effects of religious afliation. While Muslims appeared less likely to approve of homosexuality than Catholics, Orthodox Christians, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists and people with no religion, they did not differ signicantly from Protestants in their attitudes about homosexuality. One reason for Protestants and Muslims similar attitudes may be the brand of Protestantism that is growing. While the Catholic Church and mainline Protestant denominations have been losing members, conservative Protestant religious groups, like Pentecostals, have been steadily increasing, not just within the United States and Europe, but across the globe (Finke and Stark, 1992; Robbins, 2004; Stark, 2001). Relative to mainline Protestants and Catholics, conservative Protestants tend to take a literal interpretation of the bible, and they have remained steadfast in their traditional beliefs about sexual morality (Ammerman, 1987; Petersen and Donnenwerth, 1997). Hence, compared to Jews, Catholics and mainline Protestants, conservative Protestants tend to have more conservative sex-related attitudes (for pro-life attitudes see Jelen and Wilcox, 2003) and behaviors (for extramarital sex see Adamczyk and Felson, 2008 and Trinitapoli and Regnerus, 2006). In our study we were not able to distinguish between mainline and conservative Protestants. However, high conservative Protestant membership growth across the world may result in all Protestants appearing more conservative. As a result, Protestants are more likely to resemble Muslims in their attitudes about homosexuality, than people of other Judeo-Christian faiths. We also found that despite harsher penalties for people found guilty of homosexuality in Muslim nations, residence in a Muslim nation does not appear to encourage more disapproving attitudes than residence in Buddhist, Protestant, or Orthodox nations. By contrast, living in a Muslim-majority, rather than a Catholic country, appears to encourage disapproving attitudes about homosexuality, even for people who are not religious. Moreover, the magnitude of the relationship between attitudes about homosexuality and living in a Catholic, rather than a Muslim nation, was one of the largest of all the predictors we examined. Like Islam, the Catholic Church does not ofcially support homosexuality. But, unlike Islam, the Catholic Church in Europe has experienced declining membership since Vatican II, which may have reduced the power of the church to inuence laws, policies, media, norms, family structures and so forth (Casanova, 1996; Finke, 1997; Kowalewski, 1993). In Latin America, where the Catholic Church has remained relatively strong, issues associated with economic inequality have gained importance (Smith, 1991). If the growing number of conservative Protestants and Muslims across the world is any indication, religions inuence is not declining, even as countries develop and stabilize. However, shifts in the issues of interest to religious leaders and adherents could have a powerful bearing on the development of national policies and laws, including the legality of homosexuality. Future research might look at how issues of importance to religion shift and the extent to which these shifts are associated with nationwide changes like, economic development, increases in education, political stability, and democracy. There are some limitations with the data and analysis that warrant discussion. To date there are two major ongoing surveys that are typically used to asses cross-national attitudes. These are the World Values Survey and the International Social Survey Program (ISSP). The ISSP is primarily conducted in Western industrialized nations, and as a result, the sampling, measurement, and eldwork tends to be of a higher quality than the WVS.18 Unfortunately, no Muslim countries have ever been included in the ISSP. Hence, it is not possible for us to test for Muslim effects with the ISSP. As both the ISSP and WVS continue to expand, researchers will be able to do analyses with a more diverse array of countries and include more country-level control variables. More detailed information on specic religious beliefs among Protestants is also needed to separate mainline from conservative Protestants. At least three systems of classication have been developed and are used to distinguish between these groups in the United States (Alwin et al., 2006; Smith, 1991; Steensland et al., 2000). More research is needed to develop a classication system that could cross-nationally distinguish between various Muslim and Protestant groups, particularly if cross-national comparisons are made between Muslims and Protestants. When surveys focus on a single nation or similar region of the world, we can forget how much of a countrys cultural and religious context may shape the realities in which people live. In the Netherlands, for example, same-sex couples can marry and adopt children, but in Iran a conviction of homosexual sex is punishable with death. It may seem obvious to say that
18 For problems with validity measurements in the WVS, see MacIntosh (1998a,b). For issues related to aggregating the WVS to the country level, see Silver and Dowley (2000). For a brief overview of the variation in the cross-national quality of eldwork, see EVSG (2000).

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social scientists should focus on contextual effects. However, prior research has been more interested in explaining peoples attitudes with micro-level variables, particularly in the United States where religious individualism has been emphasized. Among other things, this study shows the extent to which economic development and religion can inuence public opinion about homosexuality, which, in turn, may shape norms, laws and policies that could seriously alter the course of some peoples lives. References
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