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Research on the importance of values often focuses primarily on one domain of social predictors (e.g., economic) or limits its scope to a single dimension of values. We conduct a simultaneous analysis of a wide range of theoretically important social influences and a more complete range of individuals' value orientations, focusing both on value ratings and rankings. Results indicate that traditional institutions such as religion and parenthood are associated with more concern for the welfare of others and maintaining the status quo, whereas more individually oriented occupational factors like higher income and self-employment are linked to achievement and change-related values. Yet several factors, such as education and gender, have complex associations when individual values are examined as part of a coherent system rather than in isolation.

The dialectic between the adolescent quest for autonomy and parents' desire to regulate this quest are explored by examining the extent to which the association between adolescent work intensity and substance use is mediated and moderated by parenting practices. Results using data from the National Survey of Youth and Religion (N = 3,290) show that the association between work intensity and alcohol use is mediated by parenting practices. There is also limited support for the moderational role of parental monitoring with respect to heavy drinking. Finally, connections among work intensity, parenting practices, and substance use are pronounced for adolescents younger than 16 years of age. These findings suggest the importance of a multifaceted view of parenting practices that both shape and are shaped by their adolescent's search for independence.

Background Religion and science are typically portrayed as fundamentally at odds and in competition over truth claims. Yet recent studies have shown that many Americans, including scientists, do not necessarily hold such a straightforward perspective on this complicated relationship. The majority of current studies have been limited in fully capturing the way people construct and understand the relationship between these domains given their predominant use of close-ended survey methodologies. Purpose This study seeks to enhance our knowledge of how people navigate religion and science issues by allowing young adults to respond to open-ended questions from semi-structured, in-depth interviews about how they navigate the domains of religion and science. Methods We analyze 214 qualitative, in-depth interviews with young adults who participated in Wave 3 of the National Study of Youth and Religion. Results Results confirm that a warfare model is not the dominant perspective among young adults today. Rather, analyses revealed five predominant themes among young adults: (1) They commonly construe this relationship in purely individualistic terms, believing people do and should sort the truth out for themselves; (2) They see the two as mutually deficient and therefore both are needed to answer different questions; (3) Their understanding of this relationship reduces to how one views the origins of the world; (4) They believe the two can actually be mutually supportive; and (5) Any contention between the two stems from institutional conflicts, primarily in the realm of education, not competing claims about fundamental truths. Conclusions and Implications Beliefs about religion and science among young adults are complex and not captured fully by close-ended survey questions. This question is clearly one that most young adults have considered and can articulate. Future research should consider how these beliefs are formulated and what influence they have on life outcomes.

Early religion scholars stressed the importance of institutionalized \"rites of passage\" to integrate and reinvigorate groups themselves. Surprisingly, little work, however, has explored the efficacy of such rites for the religious lives of individuals. Although research has examined the transformative role of semi-institutionalized rites like short-term mission trips and pilgrimages, we shift the focus to consider the potential influence of more fundamental initiation rites such as baptism, first communion, and bar/bat mitzvahs. Utilizing surveys 1 and 4 of the National Study of Youth and Religion and focusing on overall religiosity and disaffiliation as the outcomes, we examine whether experiencing a religious rite of passage during or before one's teenage years predicts the religious outcomes of young adults. We find no difference in religiosity over time between persons who experienced a religious rite passage and those who did not. However, those who underwent a religious rite of passage were 30 percent less likely to disaffiliate between data collection points. Tests for interactions show that the influence of such initiation rites does not vary across religious traditions. Findings suggest the experience of baptism, bar/bat mitzvah, confirmation, or other rites of passage matter primarily as durable markers of social identity, binding adherents to their faith community, if only nominally.

Given waning second language (L2) enrollments in K‐16 contexts, L2 programs must strive to understand their learners, as changes in their sociocultural environment can impact students' attitudes and, subsequently, their desire and ability to learn an L2. Thus, the authors conducted a two‐wave analysis of 68 first‐year L2 students' attitudes, dispositions, and expectations of L2 learning. Findings show that, as a group, first‐year students entered the postsecondary arena with positive dispositions. Analyzing students' traits and prior L2 experiences was a more illustrative way of predicting how their opinions evolved. Specifically, female gender, lack of pre‐high school L2 instruction, lack of travel experience in a country where the L2 is spoken, and enrollment in a 100‐level course were all found to negatively shape these attitudes over time. The authors contend that L2 programs should regularly analyze learners' dispositions along with their traits to better engage and retain first‐year postsecondary L2 students. The Challenge Why should second language (L2) programs systematically evaluate first‐year postsecondary students' attitudes and expectations toward L2 learning? What learner traits might condition these opinions? How can tracking the development of these self‐reported attitudes and expectations over time assist practitioners in better serving their students?

Research indicates that religiosity inhibits adolescent and young adult sexual behavior, but few studies examine how religious contexts may shape sexual behavior. When religious contexts are considered, studies rarely test multiple spheres of religious influence simultaneously. Moreover, little research examines how either individual religiosity or religious contexts shape emotional responses to sex. We analyze nationally representative, longitudinal data that allow for concurrent examination of multiple religious contexts and several measures of young adult sexual behaviors and sexual regret. The influence of religiosity on sexual behavior and regret varies within and across both the spheres and outcomes tested. Individual religious salience and close ties with parents are the most consistent deterrents to initiation of sexual intercourse and having numerous intercourse partners. Closeness to parents and participation in religious activities are associated with lower odds of sexual regret, but ties to adults in one's religious congregation are associated with increased sexual regret.

Using panel data from the National Study of Youth and Religion, we examine the effect of beliefs about evolution in high school on several postsecondary educational outcomes. Results indicate that net of a host of background factors and potential alternative explanatory factors, there are significant associations between beliefs about evolution and pursuing or obtaining a bachelor's degree, such that pure creationists (i.e., creationists who do not allow for the possibility that God used evolution to create the world) are less likely than naturalists to be on this trajectory. Further, when they do attend college, pure creationists and flexible creationists (i.e., creationists who allow for the possibility that God used evolution) both attend less selective colleges than naturalists, and pure creationists are less likely than naturalists to major in biology. These results suggest that evolution is a morally salient issue for many that influences their educational trajectories, highlighting the role that cultural schemas can play in shaping socioeconomic status.

A wide-held assumption is that increased religiousness is associated with stronger perceptions of a conflict between religion and science. This article examines this assumption using four distinct questions asked on the third wave of the National Study of Youth and Religion (NSYR). Results indicate a variety of viewpoints for constructing the relationship between science and religion, rather than a simple conflict-compatibility continuum. Further, findings suggest that increased religiousness among emerging adults is associated with a stronger agreement in science and religion's compatibility, rather than conflict. Incorporating New Age or non-Western spiritual tradition and a strict adherence to fundamentalist Christian doctrine are associated with complex configurations of beliefs on the relationship between religion and science. Collectively, the findings among emerging adults contradict traditional assumptions about how religious experiences influence beliefs, suggesting that such social factors may influence beliefs and attitudes uniquely at different points in the lifecourse or across generations. More broadly, the findings speak to the ongoing debate about the extent to which differing social experiences may produce consistent or discordant sets of beliefs and values, and in turn how particular configurations may impact strategies of action across a range of life domains.

A number of recent studies have examined the connection between pornography use and relationship outcomes for Americans already in marriages. The current study takes this research in a different direction by examining (1) whether pornography use may be associated with entrance into marriage during early adulthood and (2) whether this association is moderated by gender and religion, two key factors strongly related to both pornography use and earlier marriage. Longitudinal data were taken from waves 1, 3, and 4 of the National Study of Youth and Religion, a nationally-representative panel study of Americans from their teenage years into early adulthood (N = 1691). It was theorized that frequent pornography use at earlier survey waves may foster more sexually progressive attitudes that may lead to devaluing marriage as an institution, and, for religious men in particular, may disincentivize marriage as a “socially legitimate” means of sexual fulfillment. The association between pornography use and marriage entry was non-linear for men and non-existent among women. Among men, higher frequency pornography viewers were not significantly different from non-viewers in their likelihood of marriage entry. Compared to more moderate levels of pornography use, however, higher levels of pornography use in emerging adulthood were associated with a lower likelihood of marriage by the final survey wave for men. Associations were not moderated by religiosity for either gender. Data limitations and implications for future research are discussed.

Much research on adolescent deviance has supported a theory of social control, asserting that the lack of ties to institutions (such as school and parents) increases an adolescent's likelihood of using illicit substances. Researchers in this tradition often posit religion as one among many sources of norm enforcement. Yet religion may impact adolescents' behavior more directly through its ability to create beliefs and identities that are incompatible with illegal substance use. This paper uses a nationally representative, longitudinal data set of adolescents, the National Study of Youth and Religion, to examine the influence of traditional measures of social control, religious social control, and a new measure of religious salience on the probability of adolescents' first marijuana use. Results demonstrate that religious salience is more predictive of this initiation than are measures of involvement with religious organizations and several common social control indicators. We also find substantial interactions between different forms of religiosity. In the conclusion, we consider broader implications for understanding religion's influence on deviance.