Brooklyn Evann Walker
Publications
Christ, Country, and Conspiracies? Christian Nationalism and Belief in Conspiracy Theories, forthcoming at the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion
With Abigail Vegter
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 attempting to figure out why. Recent research suggests Christians are especially susceptible to belief in conspiracy theories (Cox 2021), but scholars have yet to ascertain how a certain subset of Christians – Christian nationalists – respond to common conspiracy theories. Using the Chapman Fear Survey, we attempt to fill this gap in the literature. After generating a distinct scale measuring belief in common conspiracy theories in the United States, we make use of Whitehead and Perry’s (2020b) measurement of Christian nationalism to determine if this brand of religion impacts the likelihood that one will believe in common conspiracy theories. We find that Christian nationalism significantly predicts belief in common conspiracy theories, especially when combined with literalist views of the Bible.
Fear, Loathing and Anger: Emotion and Demographic Change and Support for Christian Nationalism, forthcoming at Public Opinion Quarterly
With Donald Haider-Markel
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 or a cover for discomfort with racial diversity and equality? Is Christian nationalism rooted in fear of social change, anger about social change, or something else? We use a survey experiment to isolate the effects of knowledge of religious vs. racial demographic change among White Christians and find that it is religious demographic change, not racial demographic change that shift support for Christian nationalism and perceptions of discrimination against Whites and Christians. This effect is mediated by emotion—religious demographic change increases fear and disgust, when then influence support for Christian nationalism and perceptions of discrimination against Whites and Christians.
Religious Liberties or Reading Rainbows? The partisan implications of religious liberties frames in education attitudes at Social Science Quarterly
With Donald P. Haider-Markel
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.
Working Papers
Holy Nations: How White Racism Boosts Black Support for Christian Nationalism (under R&R)
The Christian faith has historically been deeply rooted in the social fabric of the United States (Finke and Stark 2005). As a consequence, various expressions of public religion have been articulated by both political and religious elites as they seek to connect the events of the day to religious worldviews. Although some political God talk seeks to inspire a sense of God’s blessing on the nation and aspirational visions for future progress towards inclusion and national community, other types of public religion seek to prioritize the values and belonging of Christianity and Christians above other faiths.
How Christian Nationalism and Femininity Shape Extreme Politics Among Men in the US (under review)
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 wellestablished theory, 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.
Christian Nationalism so White: The Impact of Priming Race on Support for Christian Nationalism (under review)
With Donald Haider-Markel
The Christian faith has historically been deeply rooted in the social fabric of the United States (Finke and Stark 2005). As a consequence, various expressions of public religion have been articulated by both political and religious elites as they seek to connect the events of the day to religious worldviews. Although some political God talk seeks to inspire a sense of God’s blessing on the nation and aspirational visions for future progress towards inclusion and national community, other types of public religion seek to prioritize the values and belonging of Christianity and Christians above other faiths.
Is it *White* Christian Nationalism? Examining the Conditional Effects of Race
With Paul A. Djupe, Brian R. Calfano, Andrew R. Lewis, and Anand Edward Sokhey
The rapidly expanding literature on Christian nationalism has taken a turn, choosing to focus on White Christian nationalism without, as yet, a systematic analysis of whether that segmentation is justified, both in scale construction and the analysis of subgroups. In this paper, we will focus on subgroup analysis. To be sure, the predominant politics of Christian nationalists in the US suggests the effects of Christian nationalism should be more heavily concentrated among whites – limiting immigration, gun control, LGBT rights, the role of science (and more) while expanding patriarchal structures, harsh punishments for crimes, and police authority in apprehending suspects. Yet, the influence of Christian nationalism is not limited to whites, with racial minorities loading highly on the scale. The samples typically employed to assess the relationships with Christian nationalism are not ideal for assessing the differential effects of race, however, given the typically small numbers of non-whites. Therefore, we turn to a sample tailor-made for this endeavor with equal numbers (~1,600 each) of whites, Blacks, and Latinos surveyed in September 2022. The survey included the standard measures used to capture CN along with a wide range of policy attitudes, some of which are racialized (e.g., voting rights and policing) and some of which are not understood to have racial connotations (e.g., abortion, LGBT rights, and flag burning). We can therefore assess under what conditions Christian nationalism has differential effects by race. We end by developing suggestions for future work that links race with Christian nationalism.
An Army for God: Gun Ownership, Christian Nationalism, and Support for Political Violence
With Donald Haider-Markel and Abigail Vegter
Political violence in the U.S. is rare, but recent rises in political extremist motivated violence suggest we could be in the early years of a new wave of right-wing violence. This rise in violence coincides with increases in Christian nationalist preachers and adherents as well as an increased linkage between protecting religious freedom and gun rights. We engage the growing literature on gun politics and Christian Nationalism to explore whether gun owning Christian Nationalists are more likely to believe that using force against the government can be justified. We know that new political identities are being formed around gun ownership and Christian Nationalism. These identities have implications for political behavior including voting turnout and vote choice. Less is known about how these identities shape policy preferences and political attitudes. Christian Nationalists believe that their identity is under threat making it more likely that they might be willing to pursue drastic measures in pursuit of self-protection. For gun owners, we extend the logic of existing studies and hypothesize that gun ownership is associated with a greater propensity towards violence and the belief that use of violence is an effective means to solving (political) problems. We further argue that gun advocates have intermixed with Christian Nationalists, increasing the likelihood that both might be likely to support the use of violence against the government. We test these hypotheses making use of data from a nationally representative survey of American adults. Our results support our arguments, with a few important caveats.
Words and Attitudes of the Heart: The Emotional Content of Christian Nationalist Communications
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 effect 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 non-nationalist, 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.