When Muslims Are Perceived as a Religious Threat: Examining the Connection Between Desecration, Religious Coping, and Anti-Muslim Attitudes

Religion as Catalyst or Restraint of Radical Right Voting?

“…In psychological literature much attention has been paid to this dimension, referring to religious fundamentalism as the most extreme position towards theological teachings (e.g. Abu Raiya et al 2008;Altemeyer 2005). The psychological literature provides the religious coping theory (Pargament 1997) that describes how religious beliefs may be associated with anti-immigrant attitudes and could help to understand how religious beliefs may relate to RRP voting.…”

“…Various scholars investigated whether Christians may be more prejudiced towards Muslims as a result of coping with the potential threat of Muslims (e.g. Abu Raiya et al 2008;Rowatt and Franklin 2004;van der Slik and Konig 2006). In line with their results, we argue that one's religious coping method is associated with the content of one's religious beliefs and anticipate that people with an orthodox belief system -based on 'teachings that clearly contain the fundamental truth about humanity and deity' (Altemeyer 2005) -may develop more negative attitudes towards (Muslim) immigrants 1 than people who have a more mainstream, tolerant belief emphasising Christian charity.…”

“…The increasing number of immigrants has fuelled the prevalence of other religions, and in particular Islam, in West European countries, with religious leaders propagating fundamental different truth claims than their Christian counterparts. We anticipate that especially orthodox Christians, that is Protestants and Catholics with orthodox beliefs, may feel religiously threatened by the increasing prevalence of other religions brought to the countries by immigrants (Abu Raiya et al 2008), which could intensify their anti-immigrant attitudes. This in turn may make anti-immigrant RRPs preferred over Christian parties that do not have or do not emphasise an anti-immigrant stance.…”

North American sociology of religion: Critique and prospects

“…In Psychology there is considerable work on prejudice, discrimination, and health outcomes, but of course the disciplinary approach necessarily individualizes many of the dynamics involved. See, for example, Johnson et al, 2012;Mavor et al, 2009;Pargament et al, 2007;Raiya et al, 2008;Rowatt et al, 2009;Wink et al, 2007. …”

Dogmatism, coping, and spirituality : predicting mental health among the religious and the secular.

“…Unfortunately for interpretive considerations, religious fundamentalism's relationship with religious/spiritual coping is not clear cut. For instance, Raiya, Pargament, Mahoney, and Trevino (2008) found that religious fundamentalism was moderately related to multiple forms of negative religious/spiritual coping styles (r = .39 to .42) but substantially less related (r = .11) to an indicator of positive religious/spiritual coping. This particular finding is difficult to make sense of when previous research has found that both stronger belief systems and positive religious/spiritual coping are related to better mental health.…”