Journal Review: The Role of Religious Fundamentalism

This study published in the most recent issues of Psychology of Religion and Spirituality explores the relationship between religious fundamentalism and collective narcissism and extreme group behavior moderated by so-called “tightness-looseness” of a group’s norms and tolerance for deviations from those norms—the more tightness, the less acceptable behaviors considered deviant are judged by group members.

Collective narcissism refers to extreme levels of positive in-group regard which in the case of religious fundamentalists may come in part from their belief that their religion alone is the only source of truth. Further, collective narcissism increases with increased levels of tightness.

Researchers found that religious fundamentalism is more likely to predict extreme behaviors when impacted “by contextual factors such as perceived tightness-looseness” and/or collective narcissism, meaning that is is possible for religious fundamentalists to be strongly committed to their beliefs and remain tolerant of others who do not believe or act in ways that align with their beliefs.

Although the authors correctly identify a number of important weaknesses in their study, one particular strength is that both groups studied were forms for Sunni Islam—again, suggesting that there can be significant differences in the relationship between strong religious beliefs and the risks of extreme behavior.

Figure 1: Depiction of the proposed model .

Yustisia et al. reference an earlier, and very interesting study conducted in part at Brigham Young University (BYU) that examined the effect of scriptural violence on participants’ aggression . Participants were asked to read a passage from the Old Testament and told either that it was from the Bible or from an ancient scroll. Additionally, some participants read the same passage but with an added verse stating that God authorized violence in the context of the passage they read. After reading the passage, BYU students who were told that the passage came from the Bible acted more aggressively in an unrelated task than those told it was from an ancient scroll as were those who read the passage that included the additional verse.

Figure 2: Effect of belief in God after reading a violent passage where God sanctioned or not the violence .

The study was then repeated with a group of students Vrije University in Amsterdam. Again, those who read the passage with the additional verse were more aggressive in the task, with those who believed in God or the Bible being the most aggressive. Researchers argue that the results of their study provide evidence that “exposure to a scriptural depiction of violence or to violence authorized by diety can cause readers to behave more aggressively” .

Clinical Implications

There are a number of interesting clinical implications that can be derived from these two studies. Today I’ll focus on just one. For those who work with clients from Mormon or Latter Day Saint restorationist movement religions consider levels of religious fundamentalism, collective narcissism, tightness or looseness of the community (or sub-community), and engagement with scriptural passages that appear to provide God’s approval for aggression (e.g., 1 Nephi 4:10-18) when doing suicide and homicide risk assessments.

Thoughts?

References