Publication Date
2026
Presentation Length
Poster/Gallery presentation
College
College of Sciences & Mathematics
Department
Psychological Science, Department of
Student Level
Undergraduate
Faculty Mentor
Adam Smiley
Metadata/Fulltext
Metadata ONLY
Presentation Type
Poster
Summary
There is a general understanding of an individuals’ political/religious beliefs when you analyze predictors like support of same sex marriage or views on abortion, but there is not a ton of research on how everyday lifestyle factors might affect how someone aligns themselves politically or religiously. Researchers have begun to expand the horizons of political and religious research by investigating how income, health, and politics affect religion (Francis-Tan & Tian, 2022), but there is a need to expand into more specific lifestyle factors. Which brings reason to question a few things: what lifestyle and demographic factors predict how religious someone is? What lifestyle and demographic factors predict political orientation? And what factors predict religious-political alignment? To answer these questions, I will use the General Social Survey from 2024 (N=3309). I hypothesize that gun owners will report higher levels of religiosity than non-gun owners, individuals living in the Southern United States will report the highest levels of mean religiosity, internet usage will be associated with higher levels of liberalism, individuals with a higher income will be more conservative, after controlling for education and region, gun ownership and low social trust will predict high religious-political alignment, while controlling for income and region, and high marijuana support will be significantly associated with low religious-political alignment. Data will be analyzed and the results will be presented at SPARK.
Recommended Citation
Price, Madison A., "Lifestyle Factors' Effect on Political and Religious Behavior" (2026). SPARK Symposium Presentations. 937.
https://repository.belmont.edu/spark_presentations/937
Included in
American Politics Commons, Data Science Commons, Religion Commons
