Dominion or Stewardship: Understanding the Role of Religiosity in Forming Attitudes about the Environment through Pathway Analysis

Abstract

Though a large body of research on the relationship between religiosity and environmentalism exists, the results of empirical research tend to be inconsistent showing support for both a dominion and a stewardship perspective among devout Christians. This study uses a structural equation model to determine if the effect of religiosity on environmentalism is mediated by any other factors. The results of the study show that religiosity is mediated by two factors, conservative political ideology and political activism, and that these two factors influence environmentalism in opposite directions, effectively washing out any direct effect from religiosity. These results provide a possible explanation for why religiosity appears to be a weak and inconsistent predictor of environmentalism by itself.

Keywords: Religion, Christianity, Environmentalism, Conservatism, Political Activism