Sexism, Organizational Maintenance, and Localism: A Research Note

Abstract

Analysis of survey data from a national sample of lay church members in England examines the assertion that the associations observed previously between religious sexism and internalization of the organizational maintenance motif are spurious. The results indicate that the relationships in question are replicated in this study. While the analysis also indicated that measures of localism—the test variable—are predictive of differences in religious sexism, the initial associations between sexism and organizational concerns remain in the partials. Localism does not explain away the zero-order correlations. These patterns imply that the congregational level of analysis and the perspective of local community attachments are best conceived of as separate conceptual spaces as possible explanations of differences in religious sexism.