Religious Schools, Home Schools, and Gender-Role Beliefs in Adulthood

Abstract

Background When parents in the United States choose to send their children to religious schools or to home school, they are often motivated, at least in part, by a desire to transmit religious beliefs to their children. These religious beliefs may in some cases promote traditional gender roles that are built into religious tenets, practices, and subcultural identities. Purpose With this in mind, we examine whether religious schools act as distinct sites of religious gender socialization by considering the following questions: (1) do Americans who attend religious high schools and homeschools hold more conservative gender-role beliefs later in life compared to their public school peers? and (2) does attending a religious school have a differential effect on gender beliefs for men or women? Methods We use data from the Cardus Education Study—the largest nationally representative survey that includes religious high school and home school graduates as well as measures of religiosity—and logistic regression to explore the gender-role beliefs of 24–39 year olds who graduated from conservative Protestant, Catholic, public, and home schools. Results Graduates of the different religious school sectors we examined varied in their tendencies to hold more traditional gender-role beliefs. Specifically, we find that graduates of conservative Protestant schools and home schools held more conservative gender-role beliefs than graduates of other sectors. In contrast, Catholic school graduates—particularly female graduates—held more egalitarian beliefs compared to the other sectors. Conclusions and Implications In light of these findings, we discuss potential mechanisms within school environments that may contribute to the enactment of gender and religion. We extend empirical and theoretical knowledge about gender socialization, an area of critical importance given its ability to influence people's aspirations, choices, and life outcomes as well as social norms and policies.