Religion and Prejudice in Ghana and Canada: Religious Fundamentalism, Right-Wing

Research has established that religious orientation (especially religious fundalnentalism), right-wing authoritarianism, and attitudes towards minority groups are interrelated (Altemeyer, 1996; Altelneyer Hunsberger, 1995, 1996). The present study attempted to address the lack of cross-cultural research on these is- sues, comparing Ghanaian and Canadian samples. The psychonetric properties of the scales used remained acceptable in the Ghanaian sample, although (with the exception of the Attitudes Towards Woinen scale) they were generally weaker than those obtained with Canadian samples. As expected, right-wing authoritarianisln and religious fundanentalisrn were positively correlated, and both were in turn associated with negative attitudes toward homosexuals and women. Partial correlations indicated that right-wing authoritarianism was the better predictor of sexism, but religious fundanentalism best predicted holnophobia. Scale properties and intercorrelations were reasonably robust for Christian and Muslim subsa~nples of Ghanaians. Finally, the type of secondary school attended was differentially related to men's and women's ho~nophobic attitudes, with male-only school attendance associated with stronger holnophobic attitudes, compared to mixed-sex school attendance. This ef- fect remained significant when the effects of religious fundanentalists were controlled. Women's same-versus mixed-sex school attendance was unrelated to homophobic attitudes.