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Articles 1 - 2 of 2
Full-Text Articles in Other American Studies
A Bounded Affinity Theory Of Religion And The Paranormal, Joseph O. Baker, Christoper Bader, F. Carson Mencken
A Bounded Affinity Theory Of Religion And The Paranormal, Joseph O. Baker, Christoper Bader, F. Carson Mencken
Sociology Faculty Articles and Research
We outline a theory of bounded affinity between religious experiences and beliefs and paranormalism, which emphasizes that religious and paranormal experiences and beliefs share inherent physiological, psychological, and ontological similarities. Despite these parallels, organized religious groups typically delineate a narrow subset of experiences and explanatory frames as acceptable and True, banishing others as either false or demonic. Accordingly, the theory provides a revised definition of the “paranormal” as beliefs and experiences explicitly rejected by science and organized religions. To demonstrate the utility of the theory, we show that, after controlling for levels of conventional religious practice, there is a strong, …
Images Of God: The Effect Of Personal Theologies On Moral Attitudes, Political Affiliation, And Religious Behavior, Christoper Bader, Paul Froese
Images Of God: The Effect Of Personal Theologies On Moral Attitudes, Political Affiliation, And Religious Behavior, Christoper Bader, Paul Froese
Sociology Faculty Articles and Research
Social scientists often explain religious effects in terms of religious group affiliations. Typically, researchers identify religious groups by denomination or some broader popular categorization, such as “fundamentalist” or “evangelical.” To capture religious differences more effectively, Steensland et al. (2000) propose an intricate classification of American denominations that takes into account the theology and historical development of various American religious traditions to predict individual attitudes and behaviors. We believe that equal care and attention should be devoted to the development of key measures of belief that may cross denominational lines. In this article, we propose one such measure: personal conceptions or …