Religious fundamentalism as related to both antisocial and prosocial consequences

Past research on religious fundamentalism was mainly focused on its associations with problematic attitudes, such as prejudice and violence. But can religious fundamentalism be related to some prosocial attitudes as well? In our research we made a shift in the perception of religious fundamentalism and investigated how it relates to prosocial attitudes, depending on the target and specific religious context. Religious fundamentalists are authoritarian in the way they approach religious issues but we should not forget that they are also religious. As such, they not only possess characteristics typical for authoritarian persons but should also share some characteristics with religious persons. We assumed that one such important characteristic is a tendency for prosocial attitudes, at least towards some targets. Also, can prosocial attitudes of religious fundamentalists depend on exposure to specific religious contexts? We investigated how prosocial attitudes of persons scoring high on religious fundamentalism might change depending on exposure to religious texts which command prosociality vs. legitimize violence. Finally we examined real behavioral manifestations of both prosociality and prejudice: we investigated whether prosocial attitudes of religious persons assessed on the self-reported measures can translate into real prosocial behavior and whether religious persons’ prejudice can manifest as physical aggression towards traditional targets of prejudice.(PSY 3) -- UCL, 201

Religious fundamentalism and limited prosociality as a function of the target

Two distinct research traditions have established that (a) religiosity implies prosocial tendencies, though limited to proximal targets, and (b) religious fundamentalism (RF) relates to prejudice, often because of underlying right-wing authoritarianism (RWA). Through two studies, we investigated the idea that RF, due to underlying religiosity, also predicts prosociality that is limited to proximal rather than distal targets. Specifically, we found that RF, unlike RWA and because of religiosity, predicted prosociality towards a nonfeminist but not a feminist target in need (Experiment 1) and willingness to help friends but not unknown people in need in the same hypothetical situations (Experiment 2). Moreover, like RWA, RF implied negative attitudes towards the feminist. This limited, not extended, prosociality of people scoring high on RF was in contrast with their self-perceptions of being universally altruistic. Fundamentalism seems to combine religiosity’s qualities (in-group prosociality) with authoritarianism’s defects (out-group derogation)

For better or worse: Fundamentalists' attitudes toward outgroups as a function of exposure to authoritative religious texts

Fundamentalism not only predicts prejudice toward outgroups but also prosociality toward proximal targets and ingroups. Taking things a step further, we hypothesized that because fundamentalists tend to show submission to religious authority, their attitudes toward unknown targets and outgroups may vary significantly depending on the nature of the authoritative religious texts to which they are exposed. In three studies using hypothetical scenarios, the association between fundamentalism and prosocial attitudes (a) became negative after exposure to a violent biblical text (Study 1; unknown targets), (b) reversed from negative to positive after reading a prosocial biblical text (Study 2; negligent targets), and (c) became negative or positive following a violent versus prosocial biblical text (Study 3; atheist target). Additional results confirmed the uniqueness of fundamentalism compared to general religiosity, quest orientation, and authoritarianism, regarding such dependency upon religious authority. Findings also support the mediating roles of reported submissiveness to religious teachings and perceived symbolic threat

Fundamentalism as dogmatic belief, moral rigorism, and strong groupness across cultures: Dimensionality, underlying components, and related interreligious prejudice.

Is fundamentalism universal across religious cultures? We investigated this issue by focusing on 3 questions: (a) the dimensionality of fundamentalism, as measured by the Religious Fundamentalism Scale (Altemeyer & Hunsberger, 2004); (b) the very nature of fundamentalism as denoting dogmatic belief, moral rigorism, or strong groupness; and (c) interreligious prejudice as predicted uniquely, additively, or interactively by religiousness and sociocognitive rigidity. We collected data from 14 countries of Catholic, Protestant, Christian Orthodox, Buddhist, Jewish, and Muslim tradition, regrouped in 7 cultural-religious zones (N = 3,218 young adults). We measured fundamentalism, the 4 dimensions of religiousness (believing, bonding, behaving, and belonging), authoritarianism, existential quest, and interreligious prejudice—negative and discriminatory attitudes toward various religious outgroups and atheists. Across religious cultures, we found that: (a) the scale is unidimensional; (b) fundamentalism is best conceptualized as a combination of dogmatic belief (believing and low existential quest) and moral rigorism (behaving and authoritarianism) and occasionally as strong groupness (belonging and authoritarianism); (c) religious dimensions, additively to and interactively with, authoritarianism and low existential quest predict interreligious prejudice (in monotheistic cultures); and (d) anti-Muslim attitudes were the highest, but fundamentalism and religiousness related most strongly to antiatheist sentiments. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved) © 2020 American Psychological Associatio