Prominent on his scholarly “to-do” list is a follow-up survey examining how self-ratings of masculinity and femininity relate to beliefs. He normally conducts his research by analyzing nationally representative surveys and by conducting interviews that focus on the “why” of behaviors and beliefs. Silva’s primary areas of interest as a scholar are gender, sexuality, family, and the sociology of rural life. What’s more, because immigrant Americans are quickly assimilating into American culture, any cultural differences in fears and beliefs may not prove stable.ĭr. Black people, who proved more likely than Whites to believe in visits from space aliens and in hauntings, may have holdover inclinations reflecting the oral history among African slaves that featured tales of ghosts.Įven while it suggested that cultures of origins inform modern beliefs, the SOCIUS paper cautioned that such speculations are unverified and require more research. For example, Asian Americans, who in their analysis of the Chapman University survey data, were more likely to fear zombies, may have been influenced by cultural traditions that include visitations from deceased ancestors. Silva and Woody’s SOCIUS paper also suggested that cultures of origin may help explain the differences in fear and beliefs among people. Nonetheless, the gender differences we found likely stem from the ways in which men’s and women’s understandings of masculine and feminine ideals shape their beliefs.”ĭrs. Of course, there are exceptions, and understandings of masculine and feminine ideals have changed a lot over the past several decades. Silva explained in his email, “Masculinity in the Western world is often linked to rationality and stoicism, whereas femininity is often linked to emotional expressiveness, spiritualism, and intuition. They did, however, suggest a difference between men and women that may explain why women were more likely to believe in spiritual phenomena and men in phenomena that are concrete but not yet understood. While the Silva-Woody analysis revealed that social categories like gender, race, and education strongly shape beliefs, the two sociologists did not make deep assessments about who believed what and why. The Chapman University survey upon which the Silva-Woody analysis relied used nationally representative data.
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Educated people (people with at least a bachelor’s degree) were less likely to believe in hauntings, alien visitations, Big Foot, or Atlantis. White people were more likely than black people to profess a belief in psychic healing and UFOs. Men more frequently reported believing in marvels like Big Foot and other phenomena that are unexplained but concrete. In general, the two sociologists found that, on the Chapman University Survey, more women than men had reported believing in ghosts and in wonders like hauntings that involved spiritual forces. For example, someone might feel certain that Big Foot haunts the forests of Humboldt County in California but also think that the idea of UFO spaceships is preposterous. Silva and Woody reported that not everyone who believes in one unusual phenomenon believes in them all.
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As had other scientists before them, Drs. Woody had found that over 70% of people believe in some paranormal phenomena - and this is despite the fact that such beliefs are stigmatized.