Islam and the “Universal” Gender Difference in Religious Commitment: A Brief Report in Response to Stark (2002)

Stark (2002) demonstrated across 57 nations that men were less likely to report being religiously oriented than were women. He concluded that a physiological difference in risk-taking among younger males might account for disinterest in religion among such males, although he would prefer to explain the gender difference as a consequence of socialization. One socialization hypothesis overlooked by Stark was that Islam as a religion might have been developed, in a small part, as a response to the gender differential observed in earlier religions. Reanalysis of Stark's 2002 data indicates that Islamic nations were more likely to yield smaller gender differences on religious questions, although the effect ranged from p <.06 to a significant p < .005, depending on the method of analysis.