Attitudes of Spiritual but Non-Religious People Toward Same-Sex Relationships and Gender Roles

In 2008 and 2018, the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) asked respondents from 44 countries if they self-identify as 'I don't follow a religion, but consider myself to be a spiritual person interested in the sacred or the supernatural' (Spiritual But Not Religious, SBNR). This paper compares issue positions on same-sex relations and gender roles between SBNR respondents and religiously active, marginally affiliated and nonreligious and nonspiritual respondents. Previous studies show that more religious individuals tend to hold more right-leaning stances on many sociopolitical issues, due to more conservative religious and political socialization as well as influences from surrounding social environments. However, these previous studies have not looked at the potentially distinct category of SBNR. Our study finds that progressive attitudes extend to both the SBNR and the nonreligious and nonspiritual, the attitudes among respondents of both these categories being very similar when it comes to same-sex relations and gender roles.