About that poll.

[jedusor]

I read in my psychology book about a study of three different groups in Northern California: seventh-graders, eleventh-graders, and college students. All of the subjects endorsed the abstract principle of freedom of religion. They were then posed the question, "What if a particular religion refused to allow low-income people to become priests?" 94% of seventh-graders, 19% of eleventh-graders, and 32% of college students responded that they would not support freedom of religion under those circumstances.

The book discussed this study in conjunction with the theory that children use more inductive thinking and adolescents are more deductive. The idea is that younger children use knowledge of facts and concrete experiences to make decisions (Piaget's concrete operational thought stage), while adolescents are able to think hypothetically and thus are more likely to abide by an abstract principle such as freedom of religion (formal operational thought). College students are moving into postformal thought, learning to combine subjective and objective thinking to come to a conclusion.

As I said when I posted the poll, it's hardly scientific, mainly because most of the people who read my journal are either already in or transitioning to the postformal stage of thought. I actually didn't realize how many of you guys are over 25 until I posted this.

I added the question about race because I thought that people who were in favor of freedom of religion when it comes to personal choice (i.e. poor people can decide whether they want to join that religion or not) might be against it when it starts to affect people who are not at all affiliated with the religion. I was surprised to find that not a single person agreed to one and not the other.

So, the results:
No one under 10 responded.
1 person in the 11-13 age bracket responded, and did not support freedom of religion under the specified circumstances.
7 people in the 14-18 age bracket responded, and 4 did not support freedom of religion under the specified circumstances.
8 people in the 19-24 age bracket responded, and 4 did not support freedom of religion under the specified circumstances.
21 people in the 25+ age bracket responded, and 5 did not support freedom of religion under the specified circumstances.

Thoughts?

Comments

Don't be silly

[misterajc.livejournal.com]

For those of you who would be against a religion which did not allow people of low income to become priests, consider a religion in which priests are required to provide food for everyone of their religion who cannot afford to feed themselves. Clearly the most rich and successful members of that religion should be the priests, as they are best able to provide for the poor and hungry. Do you still think that that religion should be banned?

And the moral of the story is, "Learn more about other people before you decide they are wrong."

Re: Don't be silly

[jedusor.livejournal.com]

Lateral thinking is certainly another aspect of cognitive maturity.