Conditional influences of the dimensions of religiosity on ecological worldviews

• Main Author: Gunawan, Lisa
• Other Authors: Michael David Gumert
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: Nanyang Technological University 2022
• Subjects: Social sciences::Psychology
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/157228
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

The causes of the global environmental crisis were said to be rooted in anthropocentric worldviews, which are shaped by religious belief systems (White, 1967). It is therefore predicted that religion’s potential to shape worldviews can instead be channelled into developing ecological worldviews, which could translate into more environmentally sustainable societies. However, past studies did not yield any substantive results that showed the ability of one’s commitment to religion, measured as religiosity, in shaping ecological worldviews. Aiming to further investigate this, this study explored the relationship between religiosity and the endorsement of ecological worldviews, along with the relationship between the five dimensions of religiosity and the endorsement of ecological worldviews, with and without the integration of environment-related topics into the real-life practices of these dimensions of religiosity. A sample of Singaporean participants from different religious backgrounds was recruited to take part in the study. They were asked to answer questionnaires adopting the Centrality of Religiosity Scale (CRS), the New Ecological Paradigm (NEP), and the Religiosity and Environment scale. Religiosity, and each dimension of religiosity, exhibited negative relationships with the endorsement of ecological worldviews. However, when there was an indication of the integration of environment-related topics into their real-life practices, it was observed that the relationship between each of the intellectual, public practice, and religious experience dimensions and the endorsement of ecological worldviews were more positive as compared to the condition that did not exhibit such integration.