Daniel V. A. Olson

Religious pluralism and participation: Why previous research is wrong

Does religious pluralism undermine or promote religious involvement?. Some secularization theories contend that diversity breeds loss of belief and lower participation. The religious economies model counters that involvement is boosted by the availability of alternative religious suppliers and the competition that results, with each group working harder to gain adherents. The issue is sufficiently important that a recent review found 193 tests of this question in 26 published articles. Almost all of these findings (both positive arid negative) should be abandoned. The associations reported do not reflect the effects of pluralism but a previously overlooked mathematical relationship between measures of religious participation and the index of pluralism. Even when pluralism has no effect on participation, the correlation between these two variables is likely to be non zero. The sign and magnitude of this expected correlation depends on the nature of the size distributions of the religious groups across the areas studied. Results from several frequently cited studies closely atch what would be expected from chance alone. Various alternative methods for studying pluralism in future research are examined, but currently there is no compelling evidence that religious pluralism has any effect on religious involvement.

Religious Market Share and Intensity of Church Involvement in Five Denominations

Proponents of the supply side approach to religion theorize that religious market share-the proportion of people in a geographical area who belong to a given denomination-is inversely related to religious commitment in that denomination. They argue that a small market share motivates religious leaders to compete harder in the religious market place, increasing the participation of members. Another perspective, often associated with secularization theory, make the opposite prediction. It argues that people find it difficult to remain religiously committed in social environments where they are numerical minorities because other people do not reinforce their beliefs and practices. We use data from a large study of financial giving to analyze the relationship between market share and commitment for five denominations in the United States. We find that market share has a negative effect on church financial giving within all five denominations and a weaker negative effect on attendance in three of the denominations. We explore whether these effects are the spurious byproducts of pro-religious cultural norms associated with either the South or the presence of conservative Protestants in local areas. In models pooling all denominations, the negative effect of market share on financial giving and attendance cannot be explained away by either of these factors. However, the effect on attendance can be accounted for by congregational size.

Variations in Strictness and Religious Commitment Within and Among Five Denominations

Iannaccone (1994) claims that members of churches with strict rules (e.g., no smoking or drinking) have higher average commitment because strict rules discourage involvement by less committed potential members. Most previous studies of Iannaccone’s assertions have studied congregations within a single denomination, and these studies have found little support for his claims. However, Iannaccone (1996) has responded that strictness is primarily a characteristic of denominations that varies little within a single denomination. If true, multidenominational studies are needed to detect the potential effects of strictness. Using data from a five-denomination, 625-congregation study, we find that within each denomination, strictness is not significantly related to measures of commitment. However, we also find, as Iannaccone claims, that most of the variation in strictness occurs between, rather than within, denominations. Thus, when we examine data from all five denominations, we find that strictness is strongly correlated with several important measures of member commitment levels.