Religious Dones Become More Politically Liberal After Leaving Religion

Abstract

Objective: Research has accumulated evidence for religious residue, or the tendency for aspects of religion to persist after de-identification. The current study sought to examine whether religious residue extends to political orientation; or religious dones report more liberal political attitudes after leaving religion.

Method: We report data from eight samples drawn from three countries (N = 11,017), using both cross-sectional (Studies 1a-f) and longitudinal (Studies 2 and 3) designs.

Results: Studies 1a-f (n = 7089) revealed that adult religious dones reported significantly more politically liberal attitudes than religious individuals and, when pooling samples together, never-religious individuals. Study 2 (n = 2071) confirmed religious dones report more liberal attitudes than religious individuals in a longitudinal sample of adolescents and young adults. In Study 3 (n = 1857), we replicated this longitudinal finding among adolescents and young adults and found that religious de-identification predicted a more liberal political orientation over time.

Conclusions: Rather than demonstrating religious residue in the political domain, religious dones become more politically liberal after leaving religion. We discuss this contextual boundary condition of religious residue across cultures.

Keywords: liberal; politics; religion; religious dones; religious reactance; religious residue.