Religiousness: A Gender Link Attitude

A Thesis Proposal

In Partial fulfillment for

the Degree Master of Arts in Education

major in Teaching Social Studies

Fhan Chyn P. Nierves

JANUARY 2020
 CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

There is a large body of research shows that women are more religious than

men. Based on the findings of Pew Research there is a considerable gender gap

concerning religious beliefs and practice among Christian men and women in America

because Christian women are more likely to practice their faith with behaviors like

praying daily and attending church . More than seven in 10 U.S. Christian women (72

percent) say religion is very important to them, compared to 62 percent of Christian

men. The gap is larger in the United States than in other nations like Canada, the

United Kingdom, Germany and France.

Mean while in the Philippines, only 41 percent of Catholics attend religious

services weekly.And yet about 81.4 percent of Filipinos are Catholic, according to 2015

figures from Pew Research Center. Social Weather Stations (SWS) noted that in 72

surveys on church attendance from 1991 to 2017, “weekly attendance at religious

services has always been lower among Catholics, compared to adult Filipinos in

general.”

Meanwhile, the SWS found 75 percent of Filipinos considered religion “very

important” while nine percent considered it “somewhat important.”

However,the primary purpose of this study is to bring together in one convenient

location a mass of descriptive material and to lay out as clearly as possible the range of
explanations about the main cause of gender gap among Male and Female Roman

Catholic church goers of La Fortuna, Veruela, Agusan del sur.

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

The result of the study will be benificial to the church goers since this will give

them the idea of the main reasons related to the religious commitment among female

and male.

Church. This study will help church leaders to think interventions that will help them

improve the religious participation among male and female.

Future Researchers. The result of this study will provide a better understanding for the

furture researchers who wish to pursue and conduct another angle of this research

study.Moreover, this study will also serve as reference and baseline information to

which their future studies can be reffered.

REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

Gender gap. Gender gap is a difference in opinions or attitudes between men and

women concerning a variety of public and private issues. Gender gaps in religiosity are

among the most consistent findings in the social sciences. Among self-identified

Christian men and women in America more than seven in 10 U.S. Christian women (72

percent) say religion is very important to them, compared to 62 percent of Christian

men. The gap is larger in the United States than in other nations like Canada, the

United Kingdom, Germany and France.

 On the otherhand, the SWS found 75 percent of Filipinos considered religion

“very important” while nine percent considered it “somewhat important.”

On the other hand, the gender gap on daily prayer is larger among Catholics (67

percent for women versus 49 percent for men) and mainline Protestants (62 percent

versus 44 percent).With church attendance, 38 percent of women attended religious

services weekly, while 25 percent of men did so.

As a whole, outside of Christianity, men are less religious than women. American

men are more likely to be religiously unaffiliated than women. And among the

unaffiliated, the men are less likely to ascribe to religious beliefs.

Mean while in the Philippines, only 41 percent of Catholics attend religious services

weekly.And yet about 81.4 percent of Filipinos are Catholic, according to 2015 figures

from Pew Research Center. Social Weather Stations (SWS) noted that in 72 surveys on

church attendance from 1991 to 2017, “weekly attendance at religious services has

always been lower among Catholics, compared to adult Filipinos in general.”

Meanwhile, the SWS found 75 percent of Filipinos considered religion “very

important” while nine percent considered it “somewhat important.”

The remaining 3 percent said religion was “not very important” while 13 percent said it

was “not at all important,” the SWS said.

The survey firm also found that more Filipinos who were “very happy” with their lives

saw religion as “very important.”

Churchgoers. According to Cambridge University Press 2020, Church Goers are

someone who goes to church regularly.Catholic churchgoers appear to follow late

twentieth century trends in that they are more likely to be women, to be middle aged or
elderly and to have among them few who are under 25. The whole educational

spectrum is represented and, although there are as many from manual as from non-

manual backgrounds, there are few who are 1 An active church-going population gives

the impression of solidarity. However, it is far from uniform not only in religious

convictions but also in attitudes to morality, social concerns and community tensions.

Age and education are particularly significant in accounting for this diversity;

individualistic, younger, well educated, high status Catholics contrast in a range of

religious, social and political attitudes with ageing, less well educated churchgoers from

manual occupational backgrounds. These demographic characteristics, however, do not

penetrate identity and political outlook; on these there is little disagreement.( Professor

Frederick W. Boal)

Robin Gill argues that once moral communities (such as churchgoers) take

centre stage in ethics - as they do in virtue ethics - then there should be a greater

interest in sociological evidence about these communities. This book, first published in

1999, examines evidence gathered from social attitude surveys about church

communities, in particular their views on faith, moral order and love. It shows that

churchgoers are distinctive in their attitudes and behaviour. Some of their attitudes

change over time, and there are a number of obvious moral disagreements between

different groups of churchgoers. Nonetheless, there are broad patterns of Christian

beliefs, teleology and altruism which distinguish churchgoers as a whole from non-

churchgoers. However, the values, virtues, moral attitudes and behaviour of

churchgoers are shared by many other people as well. The distinctiveness of church
communities in the modern world is thus real but relative, and is crucial for the task of

Christian ethics.

Religious Invovement. It is generally accepted by researchers that religious

involvement has many dimensions that incorporate aspects such as belief in God or a

transcendent being, membership in religious communities, distinctive religious practices

or lifestyle, and religious values (Hall et al. 2008; Hill and Pargament 2003; Hoff et al.

2008). Religious involvement may be expressed by attendance at religious services,

identification with a religious community, reading a sacred text (e.g., Torah, Koran,

Bible), and commitment to distinctive beliefs and behaviors (Levin 2009). Spirituality is a

related construct that tends to express the highly personalized and individualized

engagement with transcendence or sacred matters affecting the spirit (Hall et al.

2008; Koenig 2008). Spirituality, “intrinsic” religion, “extrinsic” religion, and related terms

have been defined in overlapping ways by different investigators over the years

(Johnstone et al. 2009), and more research is needed to confirm the distinctiveness of

these constructs, especially for minority populations.

Religious involvement is relatively high in the United States. Recent surveys indicate

that more than 83% of adults in the US population self-identify with a religion (The Pew

Forum on Religion and Public Life 2008) and that 42% of the US population reports

attending religious services weekly or almost weekly (Gallup 2009). Religious

involvement has been found to be particularly high among African Americans (Levin et

al. 1994; Taylor et al. 1996), and the African American church has historically played a

central role in the community beyond worship services and faith-based activities

(Lincoln and Mamiya 19

Like other factors that promote health (eg, exercise), religious involvement and

spirituality likely enhance resistance to disease through the interaction of multiple

beneficial mediators. As noted previously, religiously involved persons are more likely to

embrace health-promoting behaviors such as eating a proper diet, eschewing risky

behaviors such as smoking, seeking preventive services, and being compliant with

treatments. Members of a religious group may have a shared genetic ancestry that

promotes health. Religiously involved persons often have strong social support

systems, the physical and mental health benefits of which are well known. However,

these factors do not account for all the health benefits of religious involvement and

spirituality. Recent large prospective studies have adjusted for these factors and still

have found a significant relationship between religious involvement and spirituality and

positive health outcomes.

Hence, other factors likely contribute to the health benefits of religious involvement and

spirituality. Religious and spiritual practices (eg, meditation, prayer, and worship)

engender positive emotions such as hope, love, contentment, and forgiveness and limit

negative emotions such as hostility. Positive emotions, in turn, can lead to decreased

activation of the sympathetic branch of the autonomic nervous system and the

hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis (and decreased release of stress hormones such as

norepinephrine and cortisol). This response has psychological effects (eg, less anxiety)

and physiological effects (eg, decreased blood pressure, heart rate, and oxygen

consumption) that may lead to better health. Compared with uninvolved persons,

religiously involved persons have enhanced immune function. The placebo effect is a

commonly observed phenomenon in medical research and practice. Religiously

involved persons may have greater optimism and expectation for better health

outcomes and hence benefit from the placebo effect.

Nevertheless, not all the mechanisms by which religious involvement and spirituality

affect health are understood, and more studies are needed to define them better. These

mechanisms undoubtedly involve complex interactions of psychosocial-behavioral and

biological processes. Of note, this article does not account for the religious beliefs (eg,

regarding the supernatural) of individuals about the effects of religious involvement and

spirituality on health.

This study focuses on the range of explanations about the main cause of gender

gap among male and female Roman Catholic church goers According to Oxford

University Press, Religiousness is the quality of believing strongly in a particular religion

and obeying its laws and practices. It is also defined as an individual’s conviction,

devotion, and veneration towards a divinity.Meanwhile,gender refers to the role of a

male and female in society (Cross, K. 2018).

The gender gap is the difference between women and men as reflected in social,

political, intellectual, cultural, or economic attainments or attitudes.

Gender Gap

Church Goers or believers

According to Oxford University Press, Religiousness is the quality of believing

strongly in a particular religion and obeying its laws and practices.Meanwhile,gender

refers to the role of a male and female in society (Cross, K. 2018).People’s life chances,

behaviour and attitudes are profoundly affected by their gender (Trzebiatowska, M., &

Bruce, S. 2015). In many parts of the world, women especially christian women are

more religious than men. In the United States, 7 out of 10 Christians women (72%) say

religion is very important in their lives, compared with (62%) of the country’s christian

men, according to Fahmy, D 2018.

According to the latest survey of the Social Weather Stations Inc. 75% filipinos

consider their religion to be very important, 9% somewhat important, 3% not very

important.

D. THEORITICAL LENS
 In this study, the theoretical lens is anchored on Risk Preference theory of Miller

and Hoffman.Risk preference refers to the extent to which individuals are willing to

subject themselves to danger, harm, or situations that may lead to the loss of something

of value. Although this term is usually invoked in studies of economic decision making

and illicit behaviors, such as violating the law (Niederle 2015; Schwartz and

Steffensmeier 2017), Miller and Hoffmann (1995) posited that a key reason females

tend to be more religious than males in myriad ways is because of their lower

preference for risk or higher average levels of risk aversion. In general, compared to

females, males tend to prefer risks and this translates into less frequent religious

behaviors, such as attendance and prayer, and a diminished sense of religious salience.

Thus, they argued, the notable gender gap in religiousness decreases once risk

preferences are considered. Analyzing data from a nationally representative sample of

adolescents in the United States, Miller and Hoffmann (1995) found that risk

preferences attenuated the association between gender and religiousness by more than

one‐third.

PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

The purpose of conducting this study is to analyze, described and discuss the

range of explanations about the main cause of gender gap among male and female

Roman Catholic churchgoers of La Fortuna, Veruela, Agusan del sur. This study will

help church leaders to think interventions that will help them improve the religious

participation among male and female.

RESEARCH QUESTION

This study aims to determine the religious commitment among male and female

church goers in La Fortuna, Veruela Agusan del Sur.

This study had the following objectives to guide in the collection and analyses of

data:

 To determine the cause of gender gap among Roman Catholic church goers of

La Fortuna, Veruela, Agusan del sur.

 To identify the main reasons concerning to religious participation among women

in La fortuna, Veruela Agusan del Sur.

 To figure out the general reasons concerning to the religious participation among

men in La Fortuna, Veruela Agusan del Sur

CHAPTER II

METHODOLOGY

This chapter aims to present the research design, locale, research participants and

research tool that will be used in gathering data to answer the problems presented in

the previous chapter.

RESEARCH LOCALE

The research will be conducted in Roman Catholic Church located at Barangay

La Fortuna, Veruela, Agusan del Sur. This will be the research locale because the study

is to be done in this institution. The church has an expected population of 277

churchgoers.

RESEARCH DESIGN

This study makes use of a qualitative research design specifically the

explanatory approach. Explanatory Research is conducted for a problem that was not

well researched before, demands priorities, generates operational definitions and

provides a better-researched model. It allows the researcher to provide deep insight into

a specific subject, which gives birth to more subjects and provides more opportunities

for the researchers to study new things and questions new things.In this study, the

researcher aim to determine and explore the cause of gender gap among Roman

Catholic church goers of La Fortuna, Veruela, Agusan del sur.

RESEARCH PARTICIPANTS OF THE STUDY

The target respondents of this research are six (6) in which three of them will be

coming from male churchgoers and the other three from the female churchgoers .

These respondents are randomly selected Roman Catholic churchgoers of barangay La

Fortuna. Random sampling is a kind of technique in which each member of the

population has an equal chance of being chosen as a respondent of the study

(Investopedia, 2018). With this kind of sampling technique, the researchers can mitigate

the unbiased representation of the population.

 Churchgoer Population Size Sample Size Percentage
Male 86 3 3.49 %
Female 191 3 1.57 %

RESEARCH TOOL

In this study the researcher will use the semi-structured interview questions. It is

the most common methods used in qualitative research which includes in-depth

interview