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The role of religious context in children's differentiation between God's mind and human minds.
- Source :
- British Journal of Developmental Psychology; Mar2017, Vol. 35 Issue 1, p37-59, 23p
- Publication Year :
- 2017
-
Abstract
- The current study examined the cultural factors (i.e., religious background, religious participation, parents' views of prayer, and parents' concepts of God) that contribute to children's differentiation between the capabilities of human minds and God's mind. Protestant Christian, Roman Catholic, Muslim, and Religiously Non‐Affiliated parents and their preschool‐aged children were interviewed (N = 272). Children of Muslim parents differentiated the most between God's mind and human minds (i.e., human minds are fallible but God's is not), and children who had greater differentiation between God's and humans' minds had parents who had the least anthropomorphic conceptions of God. Additionally, there was a unique effect of being raised in a Religiously Non‐Affiliated home on the degree of children's differentiation between God's and human minds after religious context factors had been accounted for; in other words, children of Religious Non‐Affiliates differentiated between humans and God the least and their differentiation was unrelated to religious context factors. These findings delineate the ways in which religious context differences influence concepts of God from the earliest formation. Statement of contributionWhat is already known on this subject?Children's concept of God develops during the preschool years.The degree of anthropomorphism in children's concept of God varies.What does this study add?Muslim children have a strong differentiation between what God's mind and human minds can do.Religiously Non‐Affiliated children have almost no differentiation between God's and human minds.Parent anthropomorphism explains variance in children's God concepts, both within and across religious groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Subjects :
- DIFFERENTIATION (Developmental psychology)
IMAGE of God
FAITH development
WISDOM of God
ANTHROPOMORPHISM
PRESCHOOL children
PARENT-child relationships
AGE distribution
ANALYSIS of variance
CHI-squared test
CHILD development
CHILD psychology
COGNITION in children
CONCEPTS
CONFIDENCE intervals
STATISTICAL correlation
INTERVIEWING
PROBABILITY theory
QUESTIONNAIRES
RELIGION
RESEARCH funding
SEX distribution
STATISTICS
T-test (Statistics)
DATA analysis
CULTURAL values
TASK performance
DESCRIPTIVE statistics
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 0261510X
- Volume :
- 35
- Issue :
- 1
- Database :
- Complementary Index
- Journal :
- British Journal of Developmental Psychology
- Publication Type :
- Academic Journal
- Accession number :
- 121349680
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1111/bjdp.12160