Now that I have started to look into the reasons behind women choosing to enter into religious communities (particularly fundamentalist), I thought I would give myself a starting point by reading some literature on the reasons behind why people, in general turn to religion. This article/study by Steven Reiss is titled “Why People Turn to Religion: A Motivational Analysis.” It was written in 2000, so perhaps the world of religion has changed somewhat since the publication date, but it is still valuable data to take into account. The research question at hand is “What psychological forces drive people to turn to religion?” This study takes an already established psychological measure called the Reiss Profile of Fundamental Goals and Motivational Sensitivities. This identifies and then looks into 15 fundamental desires, beginning by evaluating ordinal data responses of “very,” “somewhat,” and “not religious” from mental retardation service providers and college students. All of these responses are found to, in some way, correlate with the 15 fundamental desires. These desires are independence, power, honor, family, vengeance, order, romance, idealism, status, acceptance, social contact, tranquility, eating, curiosity, and exercise. The two groups tested are chosen because of availability and access, which in my opinion doesn’t seem to create a completely representative sample, but the individuals within the groups seem to be of a variety of different backgrounds although 411 of the total 556 are women, and 454 are caucasian. Each individual is provided with a 120 item self- reported survey on their personal opinion in relation to aspects of the 15 fundamental desires.

The results of the study first and foremost show no difference between men and women. In general, high levels of religiosity correlate with low desires for independence. Religious people are also found to value honor more than their religious counterparts, who also place lower value in family and order. However, the author recognizes that the most significant finding is that of a correlation between high religiosity and low independence. Instead, these individuals are depending on God, which has historically been identified as a sign of weakness, but this study rejects such claims. It also shows that people who are religious are more likely to be loyal to their family and honor. Therefor, these are the forces that attract people either towards, or away from religion. More than anything, this indicates how certain individuals would like to behave, rather than how they actually do.

For the sake of my research topic, I would have liked to have seen where the data from women fell in this study. I can assume that since the individuals participating in the study were of a female majority, the results are pretty indicative of their choices. However, being able to see how their responses differed compared to men would have been interesting. Overall, the article and study was very informative and took into account a lot more facets of religious affiliation than I had ever considered before.

Reiss, S. (2000). Why People Turn to Religion: A Motivational Analysis. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 39(1), 47-52. Retrieved from http://0-www.jstor.org.books.redlands.edu/stable/1387926