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ABC News Beliefnet Poll, 2001: In this June 2001 ABC News/Beliefnet Poll, a random national sample of 1,022 Americans was asked to identify their religious affiliation in an open-ended question. Respondents were then asked to give their views on questions about stem-cell research, political affiliation, and abortion. Demographic variables include: gender, age, race, education, and income.
America's Evangelicals: As 23 percent of the American population, white evangelicals are an important part of the American mainstream whose collective voice is growing louder both in politics and in culture. In many respects, white evangelicals look like other Americans. They live all over the country, they are found in cities and small towns alike, they have friends outside of their churches, and a majority have at least some college education. They share concerns with the rest of the country about the cost of healthcare and having a secure retirement. Yet white evangelicals share a set of strongly-held beliefs about the role of religion in daily life, and they incorporate a set of religious behaviors based on these beliefs into their daily lives. It is these beliefs and behaviors that set them apart religiously and politically from the rest of the country. This study places white evangelicals in comparative perspective with mainline Protestants, Catholics, African Americans, and Hispanics.
Baylor Religion Survey, 2005: The Baylor Institute for Studies of Religion (ISR) received a major three-year grant from the John M. Templeton Foundation, to conduct a nationally representative multi-year study of religious values, practices, and behaviors, with a specific focus on consumption of religious goods and services. Using a host of new survey items that improve upon previous work, the study will yield new data to more systematically explore and better understand what sometimes appears to be an ambiguous relationship between trust, civic engagement, and religion. In partnering with the Gallup Organization, we believe this cutting-edge study has the potential to generate data that may well cause scholars to rethink our currently used measures of religious commitment or devoutness, as well as various theories linking the influence of religion to civic engagement, spiritual capital, and many other important social and behavioral outcomes.
Cross-National Data: Religion Indexes, Religious Adherents, and Other Data: This file assembles data from multiple sources, but many of the measures are from the ARDA’s coding of the 2003 US State Department’s International Religious Freedom Reports. This coding produced data on 195 different countries and territories (see Grim and Finke 2006 for a list of countries coded), but excluded the United States. Additional data on religious regulation and favoritism in the smaller countries not covered by the State Department Reports were provided by researchers at the World Christian Database. In addition, this project assembled (with permission) other cross-national measures of interest to researchers on religion, economics, and politics. They include adherent information from the World Christian Database, scales from Freedom House and the Heritage Foundation, and various socio-economic measures from the United Nations. Measures for religious persecution (AESTIMA) and ethnic identity (DETHNIC) were added to this file in August 2007.
General Social Survey, 2004: The General Social Surveys (GSS) have been conducted by the National Opinion Research Center annually since 1972 except for the years 1979, 1981, and 1992 (a supplement was added in 1992), and biennially beginning in 1994. The GSS are designed as part of a program of social indicator research, replicating questionnaire items and wording in order to facilitate time-trend studies. The 2004 data contains twelve topical modules, including modules on daily spiritual experiences and religious transformations.
General Social Survey, 2006: The General Social Surveys (GSS) have been conducted by the National Opinion Research Center (NORC) annually since 1972 except for the years 1979, 1981, and 1992 (a supplement was added in 1992), and biennially beginning in 1994. The GSS are designed as part of a program of social indicator research, replicating questionnaire items and wording in order to facilitate time-trend studies. The 2006 GSS includes a topical module for mental health. Items in the 2006 GSS include questions on religious self-identification, denominational affiliation, personal beliefs, and religious upbringing.
International Religious Freedom Data, 2001: This file contains measures from the ARDA’s coding of the 2001 U.S. State Department’s International Religious Freedom Reports http://www.state.gov/g/drl/irf. This coding produced data on 196 different countries and territories (see Grim and Finke 2006 for list of countries coded), but excluded the United States. It also includes three indexes calculated from these data: Government Regulation of Religion index (GRI), Social Regulation of Religion index (SRI), Government Favoritism of Religion index (GFI) (see Grim and Finke, 2006). The ARDA also coded International Religious Freedom Reports for the years 2003 and 2005. All three years of data (2001, 2003, and 2005) are aggregated into a single dataset, International Religious Freedom Data, Aggregate File, which we recommend as the best data to use for most statistical models.
National Congregations Study, 1998: The National Congregations Study (NCS) "dataset fills a void in the sociological study of congregations by providing, for the first time, data that can be used to draw a nationally aggregate picture of congregations" (Chaves et al. 1999, p.460). Thanks to innovations in sampling techniques, the NCS data is the first nationally representative sample of American congregations.
Manuscripts using this data file or codebook should contain the following citation: Chaves, Mark. 1998. National Congregations Study. Data File and Codebook. Tucson, Arizona: University of Arizona, Department of Sociology.
National Study of Youth and Religion, Wave 1 (2003): The National Survey of Youth and Religion (NSYR) is a nationally representative telephone survey of 3,290 English and Spanish-speaking teenagers between the ages of 13 and 17, and their parents. The NSYR also includes 80 oversampled Jewish households, not nationally representative, bringing the total number of completed NSYR cases to 3,370. The purpose of the NSYR is to research the shape and influence of religion and spirituality in the lives of American youth; to identify effective practices in the religious, moral, and social formation of the lives of youth; to describe the extent and perceived effectiveness of the programs and opportunities that religious communities are offering to their youth; and to foster an informed national discussion about the influence of religion in youth's lives, in order to encourage sustained reflection about and rethinking of our cultural and institutional practices with regard to youth and religion.
Religious Congregations and Membership Study, 2000 (Counties File): This study, designed and completed by the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies (ASARB), represents statistics for 149 religious bodies on the number of congregations within each county of the United States. Where available, also included are actual membership (as defined by the religious body) and total adherents figures. Participants included 149 Christian denominations, associations, or communions (including Latter-day Saints and Unitarian/Universalist groups); two specially defined groups of independent Christian churches; Jewish and Islamic totals; and counts of temples for six Eastern religions.
Religious Congregations and Membership Study, 2000 (State File): This study, designed and completed by the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies (ASARB), represents statistics for 149 religious bodies on the number of congregations within each state of the United States. Where available, also included are actual membership (as defined by the religious body) and total adherents figures. Participants included 149 Christian denominations, associations, or communions (including Latter-day Saints and Unitarian/Universalist groups); two specially defined groups of independent Christian churches; Jewish and Islamic totals; and counts of temples for six Eastern religions.