Research

Jesus and John Wayne Wannabees: How Christian Nationalism and Femininity Shape Extreme Politics Among Men in the US (forthcoming at Sociology of Religion)

With Paul Djupe

​

Christian nationalism, the well-known conflation of Christianity with the state, has been linked with a wide range of conservative, exclusionary, patriarchal, and anti-democratic attitudes and actions. Little work has sought to explain Christian nationalism itself and posit dispositional factors that may work to shape both the worldview as well as its outcomes. Inspired by the book Jesus and John Wayne, we explore the role of gender identity as one possible source of both Christian nationalism and extreme politics. However, instead of finding a link with (toxic) masculinity, we find that men identifying as more feminine are more Christian nationalist, adopt more sexist attitudes, support more group extremism, and are more likely to endorse violence. Following well-established literature, we argue that this pattern suggests extreme politics acts as compensatory mechanisms to project masculinity when it is lacking otherwise. Moreover, we find that these dynamics are not isolated to white Christian nationalism.

Reviewing and the State of the Discipline (forthcoming at PS: Political Science and Politics)

With Paul Djupe

​

By many accounts, the state of reviewing is in dire straits. Editors can’t get people to respond to review requests, let alone get them to say yes and complete the review on time. In previous work (Djupe 2015; Djupe et al. 2021) conducted before the pandemic, reviewing was heavily concentrated in a core set of reviewers, reviewing grew with age/rank, and political scientists stood by the value of peer reviewing for themselves, the discipline, and the research. Is any of that still true in the post-pandemic period? In this paper, we analyze a Summer 2024 survey of 637 political scientists in comparison with 2013 data and find an evident decline in reviewing post-pandemic from those who historically review most. This pattern likely reflects some broader movements, especially toward diversification, in the discipline and higher education.

Holy Nations: How White Racism Boosts Black Support for Christian Nationalism

Political Behavior, 2024

​

Current work on Christian nationalism emphasizes its strong correlation with exclusion of racial minorities and support for racialized policy, but Christian nationalism support is highest among Black Americans. If Christian nationalism is tightly bound to racism, why do Black Americans express such high levels of support for it? I argue that Black support for Christian nationalism is a response to White ethnonationalism. As Black Americans are denied their equal status as Americans, they increasingly assert their prototypicality as Americans by emphasizing their Christian identity. I employ an original survey experiment, finding that exposure to nationalist messaging in both its civic and ethnonationalist forms is related to higher levels of support for Christian nationalism among Black Christians, suggesting that the sense of national exclusion evokes Black Christians to emphasize their prototypicality as Americans. Moreover, by comparing the role of values underlying Christian nationalism support, I demonstrate that these results are not due to alternative understandings of the meaning of Christian nationalism for Black respondents. These findings shed light on Christian nationalism support as a racialized process.

· Featured in Religion in Public

A colorblind Christian country? How racial attitudes affect support for Christian nationalism and civil religion 
With Donald Haider-Markel
Politics and Religion, 2024
 
Can racial primes influence support for public expressions of religion? While a growing body of research demonstrates correlations between racial attitudes and support for public religion among White Americans, experimental tests of subconscious connections between the two concepts have been lacking. We utilize a novel survey experiment to prime racial considerations, and we find that Black racial primes raise support for Christian nationalism and civil religion among White Americans, compared to White racial primes. Moreover, our analysis indicates that these effects are attributable to racial animus, namely the evaluation that Black Americans are not prototypical members of the national community. The findings suggest that the preference for a Christian/religious America and a White America are subconsciously interwoven for many White Americans, providing the first experimental evidence, to our knowledge, of this relationship.

· Featured in Religion in Public

Words and Attitudes of the Heart: The Emotional Content of Christian Nationalist Communications

Religions, 2024

​

Christian nationalism has emerged as an important component of the relationship between religious identities and political attitudes. While several studies have analyzed the constellation of Christian nationalist elites and the effects of Christian nationalist orientations on public opinion, to date no study has explored how Christian nationalist elites message to the public or what effects these messages have. Moreover, the current literature lacks comparisons of Christian nationalism to other similar orientations. This study uses content analysis to compare the content and use of emotion language of Facebook messages of Christian nationalist, Christian Christian nationalism (CN) opposition, and patriotic groups. I find that these groups focus posts on issues that are stereotypical to the group identity, and that the use of emotion language differs by topic and group type. Additionally, groups’ use of emotion language shifts the emotional responses of readers, especially in Christian nationalist groups. This study adds to our understanding of the role of emotion in social media communications and the effects of social media communications on readers.

Fear and Loathing: How Demographic Change Affects Support for Christian Nationalism

With Don Haider-Markel

Public Opinion Quarterly, 2024

​

Christian nationalism, the fusion of religious and national identities, has emerged as an important factor shaping public opinion on a range of issues. However, debates in the existing literature on the motivations behind support for Christian nationalism remain unresolved: Is Christian nationalism a response to secularization and/or a cover for discomfort with racial diversity and equality? Is Christian nationalism rooted in fear of social change, disgust about social change, or something else? We use an experiment embedded in a national survey of adults to isolate the effects of knowledge of both religious and racial demographic change among White Christians. Our analysis suggests that exposure to religious demographic change shifts support for Christian nationalism and perceptions of discrimination against Whites and Christians, but exposure to racial demographic change has limited impact. This effect is mediated by emotion—religious demographic change increases fear and disgust, which then influence support for Christian nationalism and perceptions of discrimination against Whites and Christians. Although our treatment suggesting exposure to racial demographic change had null effects, we note that racial attitudes do independently influence support for Christian nationalism and perceptions of discrimination against Whites and Christians.

· Featured in Religion in Public

Religious Liberties or Reading Rainbows? The partisan implications of religious liberties on education attitudes

With Don Haider-Markel

Social Science Quarterly, 2023

​

Objective: Many state legislatures have moved to restrict LGBT students’ rights, and the Supreme Court has veered toward greater protection of religious free exercise protection over LGBT nondiscrimination policies. Some studies have found that rights framings are associated with heightened affective and attitudinal polarization, while others have argued that rights framings lead to greater tolerance. Do religious liberties frames affect policy attitudes or group affect? And are some groups’ use of religious liberties frames more persuasive?

Methods: We utilize data from a survey that experimentally varies candidate statements on inclusion of LGBT issues in schools using a religious liberties frame and by the group asserting religious liberties. We use the experiment to document the extent to which religious liberties framings shift support for restriction of LGBT rights in schools and affect toward religious and LGBT Americans.

Results: Our analysis suggests there are few direct effects, but that responses to religious liberties frames reflect debates within the parties about morality, social group conflict, and civic nationalism.

Conclusion: Our results add to the growing literature on religious liberty, and we argue that there is a need to understand why religious liberties frames produce effects in some circumstances but not in others.

Christ, Country, and Conspiracies? Christian nationalism, biblical literalism, and belief in conspiracy theories

With Abigail Vegter

Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 2023

​

When misinformation is rampant, “fake news” is rising, and conspiracy theories are widespread, social scientists have a vested interest in understanding who is most susceptible to these false narratives and why. Recent research suggests Christians are especially susceptible to belief in conspiracy theories in the United States, but scholars have yet to ascertain the role of religiopolitical identities and epistomological approaches, specifically Christian nationalism and biblical literalism, in generalized conspiracy thinking. Because Christian nationalists sense that the nation is under cultural threat and biblical literalism provides an alternative (often anti-elite) source of information, we predict that both will amplify conspiracy thinking. We find that Christian nationalism and biblical literalism independently predict conspiracy thinking, but that the effect of Christian nationalism increases with literalism. Our results point to the contingent effects of Christian nationalism and the need for the religious variables in understanding conspiracy thinking.

· Featured in Religion in Public, PsyPost, The Civilian