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Christopher Rowe
Dr. Daniel Young
Intro to Political Research
09 December 2011
Explaining Variation of Feelings toward Homosexual Relations
Recently, there has been talk about whether or not the “don’t ask don’t tell” law should
be removed, making it mandatory that all soldiers notify whether they are homosexual or not on
their application. Some people feel it is a violation of human rights to force a person to tell the
world about their sexual orientation. While others feel that it is something that needs to be done.
In this paper, I will attempt to explain why religious strength plays an important role in how
someone feels about homosexual relations. This variable is measured on a scale of one to four.
One meaning that the respondent feels gay rights is always wrong and four meaning that the
respondent feels that there is nothing wrong at all with homosexual relations. The first possible
explanation is religious strength, which is measured by the amount of times someone goes to
church ranging from never to every week. Meaning, the more a person goes to church, the less
they support gay rights. The second explanation that I will use is gender. This explanation is a
dummy variable, which means that it can only take two values. Those two values are zero for
females and one for males. Meaning, of males and females, males would be less supportive of
gay rights than females. Throughout this data essay, the calculations I received were from the
“GSS” dataset in Pollock’s [2009] “An SPSS Companion to Political Analysis.”
Throughout this paper, I will argue that homosexual relations and religious attendance are
negatively related, meaning as religious attendance increases, the way someone feels about
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homosexual relations is going to decrease. I think this outcome will happen because most
religious people I see are always talking about how homosexual people are sinning. Religious
attendance can also increase knowledge of their religion, and if their religion speaks negatively
about homosexuals, then they will be more reluctant to agree with the text. The correlation
between the two variables, which is measured by the Pearson’s correlation coefficient, is -0.32.
Because of the negative number, this means that the relationship takes on a negative direction
and therefore supporting my hypothesis by saying that as religious attendance increases, feelings
towards homosexual sex relations decreases. This relationship has a somewhat strong
correlation.
While flipping thru the channels one day, I found myself watching a report on the news
about gay marriage in the United States. The reporter was talking to various people on the street
about how they felt about legalizing gay marriages. What I began to realize was that out of all
the people interviewed, most people that weren’t in support of it were men. So, based off of that
and personal encounters with people, I feel that females are more likely to support homosexual
relations than males. This variable is a dummy variable, meaning it only takes on two values;
zero and one. In this case, zero will be equal to the male respondent and one is equal to the
female respondent. So, for instance, if this relationship was graphed, there would be two
different lines. Homosexual relations will be the dependent variable and religious attendance is
the independent variable. While there would still be a negative correlation between religious
attendance and homosexual relations, the line representing males will be much higher than the
line for females. Therefore, I feel there will be a positive relationship between the two variables,
suggesting that females are more likely to support homosexual relations than males. The
Pearson’s correlation coefficient for these two variables is .052.This is a positive relationship,
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which was expected, meaning that females are more reluctant to supporting homosexual
relationships and the correlation is relatively weak.
Although my two independent variables have some kind of relationship, I do not have a
valid reason why I think this is such. The two variables have a .104 correlation, which is
somewhat weak. Therefore, I expect the regression analysis to tell me more about this
relationship.
Table 1, which is pictured below, shows the analysis of a bivariate linear regression
model where homosexual sex relation is the dependent variable, and religious attendance is the
independent variable.
Table 1: The Effect of Religious Attendance on the Feeling of Homosexual Relations
B
Religious Attendance: -0.38
Std. Error
Significance Level
0.03
.000
4 categories
N=1904 R^2= .104
This result shows religious attendance to have an estimate of -.382 on homosexual
relation. This estimate suggests that it is statistically significant because its significance level
passes the .05 test with flying colors. In other words, this data is saying that we would only
expect to get an estimate this different from zero by chance alone approximately zero times in a
thousand. In order to find out whether something is substantially significant or not, we must
interpret how much the dependent variable will change every time the independent variable
changes. My measure of religious attendance ranges from one to four; one meaning someone
goes to church either never or once a year and four meaning someone goes to church either
everyday of the week or once a week. If the difference in range, 3, is multiplied by the
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coefficient, -0.382, it is equal to negative 1.14. This tells us that as a respondent jumps up one
category in religious attendance, their feelings toward homosexual relations are going to go
down a category as well. Therefore, concluding that the independent variable is substantially
significant.
Table 2 below shows the results of how two variables, religious attendance and gender
affect the dependent variable.
Table 2: The Effect of Religious Attendance and Gender on Their Feelings of Homosexual Relations
B
Religious Attendance: -.17
Std. Error
Significance Level
.01
.000
.06
.000
4 categories
Gender
.26
N=4491 R^2=.122
Considering for whether or not religious attendance plays a role in someone’s feelings
toward homosexual relations, the estimate is now -.171, meaning that the estimate actually got
smaller. The standard error went from .03 to .06, but the statistical significance level stayed the
same. Getting an estimate that different from zero will happen zero times in a thousand by
chance alone. As far as the substantial significance, it is now -.513, meaning that its substantial
significance has went down.
Now looking at the gender’s regression results, controlling for religious attendance the
estimate is .258. You would get an estimate this different from zero happening once in a
thousand times by chance alone, meaning it too has strong statistical significance. Because this is
a dummy variable, its substantive significance is simpler. When it comes to homosexual
relations, females are 2.6% more likely to support them than males are, meaning that it is
substantially significant, but is not of any large substantial significance.
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Throughout my paper, I have provided you with tables and statistics to attempt to explain
to you why people’s feelings toward homosexual sex relations vary. Based on the data I
received, I found my hypothesis to be correct. While both religious attendance and gender are
factors of someone’s feelings towards homosexual feelings, gender did not play a substantially
significant role. Although these two factors did affect someone’s feelings toward homosexuals, it
does not suggest that these are the only two factors. Future studies should include these two
factors, but should also consider the effect of someone’s upbringing, their religious affiliation,
and whether or not the respondent is a homosexual themselves. All of these are factors that could
cause feelings to vary towards homosexual relations.
Data Source:
Pollock, Philip H. 2009. An SPSS Companion to Political Analysis. Washington, D.C.: CQ Press.
“GSS2006.dta” dataset.