Education, Religiosity and Moral Attitudes: Explaining Cross-National Effect Differences

The aim of the present study is to answer three research questions on 1'1l()fal attitudes (i.e. , attitudes concerning abortian, premarital and extramarital relations, and homosexual relations).Which parental and individual characteristics affect moral attitudes?Do the effects of parental and individual characteristics vary across countries?And, if so, can these effect differences an moral issues be explained by national characteristics?To answer these questions, we use the 1991 ISSP database cantaining relevant data of 16,604 inhabitants of 15 countries.Hypotheses are tested using multi~level analyses.We find that parental andindividual religiosity, as weU as individual educational attainment, have strong effects an moral attitudes.However, we observe considerable effectdifferẽ nces across countries, which is a rather new firuJ.ing.Effects of individual religiosity an moral attitudes appear to be stranger in more religious countries andweaker in more secularized countries.Effects of individual educatian are stranger in more religiously heterogeneous countries and weaker in more religiously homogeneous countries.Finally, effects of individual educatian an moral attitudes are weaker in short~standing democracies than in lang~standing ones. EDUCATION, RELIGIOSITY AND MORAL ATTITUDES: QUESTIONSDebates on moral issues have, time and again, disrupted family gatherings, community meetings, political conventions and even nations as a whole, because people tend to hold strong and divergent views on these matters.The legal permissibility of abortion has been on the political and the public agendas for many years.The permissibility of extramarital relationships has been on the private agenda of many couples in countries all over the world, particularly since the late 19608.