Psychology

Islam is one of the fastest growing religions in America, with approximately 6 to 7 million Muslims living in America within the past decade. However, there has been little psychological research conducted focusing on the development of the Muslim American self. This inquiry addresses that gap by focusing on how familial religious affiliation during childhood and the
everyday environmental activity systems of emerging adulthood impact religious practice and the construction of the religious self among Sunni-Muslim American emerging adults (N = 63, 18-29 years) via the development of diverse mediational strategies. Utilizing an applied cultural historical activity theory–based analysis, the authors found that participants’ religious
development emerged as a diverse and dynamic process developing in relation to the interacting activity systems and sociorelational contexts of emerging adulthood.

Summary
This article explores gender differences in the religious experiences of 416 Jewish (Secular, Traditional, and Modern-Orthodox) emerging adults (M Age = 23.16). Prior research has indicated that women are more religious than men cross-culturally. The purpose of this study was to investigate
if such gender differences remain applicable to Jewish-American emerging adults given both the changing role of women in society and emerging adults’ prolonged search for identity.
Findings reveal that most gender differences in the religious values and experiences of Jewish-American emerging adults are statistically insignificant and when significant, are specific to subgroup. Furthermore, it was found that gender analyses of composite scores do not necessarily accurately report the presence or lack thereof of gender differences in religious development. It is therefore suggested that future research may benefit from the analysis of individual religious items and that efforts be made to explore within-group and between-group differences.

Building upon recent work studying how people use cultural tools and strategies to mediate conflicts (Daiute, 2010; Etengoff & Daiute, Forthcoming; Vygotsky 1934/1978), this dissertation explores systematically how gay men, their religious relatives, and therapists negotiate conflicts around religious, sexual, and familial issues. In addition, the dissertation studies how gay men and their allies use and modify religious and secular objects and systems,
such as biblical text and therapy, to address the often conflicting demands of sexuality and religion. This dissertation analyzes the conflicts and negotiational efforts that emerge within
intrapersonal, interpersonal, metaphysical and intersystem contexts for gay men and their religious families. Therefore, the principal research questions guiding this study are: How is the
process of sexual orientation and sexual orientation disclosure negotiated within a religious, familial, and societal system?; What are the salient conflicts that emerge in religious families of
gay men who have recently disclosed their sexual orientation?; How does one’s own or a relatives’ sexual orientation mediate religious orientation and activities such as bible study?;
What religious and secular objects and activities do actors across the activity-meaning system use to negotiate conflicts? In contrast to much scholarship on gay men from religious
backgrounds that focuses only on the negative impacts of institutionalized homophobia, this work focuses on how inter-group and inter-personal relations can be improved for gay men and their religious family allies.

Due to the unique socio-religious context of the participants in this study, this dissertation employs an applied activity-meaning system framework to explore how individuals and their socio-religious contexts are reciprocal agents of construction and human development. Therefore, the theoretical bases of this dissertation are Vygotsky’s (1934/1978) cultural historical
activity theory and relational complexity theory (Daiute, 2012). In addition, mediational strategies in this study are defined within the relationally complex framework of humanization (Bell & Khoury, 2011). These developmental theories are particularly relevant to gay men and their religious families due to their multifaceted interactions within relational, familial, religious and social contexts.

Fifty participants comprised of gay men (n=23), their key religious family member (n=15), and clinicians (n=12) were sampled to give voice to the multiple social relationships of gay men brought up in very religious Jewish and Christian families. All participants completed semi-structured interviews and gay men and their family allies were also asked to write a letter to a religious figure. Multiple forms of narrative construction were used to expand the unit of analysis to include the study of how families make-meaning of the interactions between their sociocultural and sociorelational experiences. In addition, the letter writing task was designed to empower participants to engage the power-laden contexts of religion and sexuality as participant activists
as opposed to only participant-observers.

Narrative analyses began with the following four process steps: (a) identification of conflict(s) and difficulties present within narrative, (b) identification of family and individual negotiation efforts, (c) Identification of cultural tool use such as religious texts, (d)
characterization of the mediational strategies. This coding system was inductively derived from the narratives and informed by cultural historical activity theory.

Analyses of participants’ relational uses of religious and popular objects support the argument that development is a meaning-making process occurring within sociocultural and
historical contexts. Furthermore, results indicate that participants’ use of religious and popular objects was often a goal directed and aimed at affecting sociorelational and sociocultural change
within their activity system. In addition, findings indicate that gay men’s and their religious family allies’ awareness of the sociocultural contexts of each other’s lived experience is an
important component in the successful negotiation of post-disclosure conflicts within religious and familial contexts. Moreover, analyses suggest that both gay men and their religious family allies successfully negotiated the conflicts between their family system, religious values, and social stigma experiences by focusing on humanization strategies such as recognizing the shared human experience and the diversity of the gay community. This investigation also illustrates that exploratory semi-structured interviews engaging participants in such acts of humanization can
potentially yield substantial improvement in family dynamics. While prior research indicates that sexual minorities can overcome the negative romantic effects of social stigma by engaging in meaning-making activities (Frost 2011), the present results suggest that this meaning-making intervention paradigm can be expanded to include other familial relationships and systems as well.

Coming-out is often described as challenging, especially for individuals from conservative religious communities (Etengoff, 2013). In an effort to explore how these sociocultural conflicts are mediated, gay men (n=16) and their family allies (n=9) from Christian and Jewish communities wrote letters to religious leaders regarding current sexual minority policies and whether they should change or remain the same. Petitioning tasks were selected as letters can shift author-audience relations to allow for non-normative and unscripted expressions (Daiute, 2004). Sixteen of the 25 participants addressed their letters to a specific religious figure, illustrating the sociorelational applicability of the task. Ninety-three problems and 75 solutions were discussed, supporting prior discussions of petitioning tasks as a form of living history and conflict mediation (Daiute, 2010). Moreover, 20/25 participants wrote about humanization needs (e.g., “we are not freaks at a freak show”), providing new conceptual structures for participatory research efforts, policy initiatives and clinical applications.

Disclosing one’s sexual identity [coming out] to family can be challenging for both parties; with some suggesting it triggers parental mourning and other relational challenges, particularly for religious families (Savin-Williams & Dube, 1998; Schnoor, 2003). However, Orthodox Jewish and conservative Christian families report diverse reactions to their relatives’ sexual orientation disclosure—while some use God as a manipulative weapon of reproach, others employ religious values of love and acceptance (Etengoff & Daiute, 2014). In a similar vein, there are conflicting reports regarding whether religious values adversely impact the coming out process (e.g., D’Augelli 2005; Serovich, Skeen, Walters, and Robinson, 1993). Yet, despite such variations, little is known about the family communication patterns that can foster post-coming out resilience and familial acceptance amidst potential religious conflicts (D’Augelli, 2005; Lee & Lee, 2006; Willoughby, 2008).  Alternatively, religious conflicts are often approached as the defining and determining characteristic of negative familial reactions to the coming-out event and the exploration of general communication styles and family system health are largely reserved for understanding non-religious families’ responses (Etengoff, 2013). However, recent research suggests that family systems can successfully use religious texts and values to negotiate cultural and familial conflicts or to promote familial estrangement and hostility (Etengoff & Daiute, 2014). In which case, it becomes imperative to explore the larger communication patterns surrounding and contributing to diverse family reactions.

Citation: Etengoff, C. (2016). “You Say You Love Me, But You Don’t Support Me”: Coming Out Communications Within Religious Family Contexts. In L. Olson & M. Fine (Eds.), The Darker Side of Family Communication: The Harmful, the Morally Suspect, and the Socially Inappropriate (pp. 201-224). New York, NY: Peter Lang Publishing, Inc.

John Bowlby (1958), the father of attachment theory, recognized that humans have a lifelong fundamental need for safety, security, and a sense of being cared for by a sensitive and responsive caretaker. Psychic life is organized around the repeated attempts to achieve safety from threat and connect to others who offer protection and security (Slade, 2014). This need is at the heart of personality formation, childhood fixation, and psychopathology. Fromm (1964) suggested that the yearning for a “paradisiacal bliss”—a symbiotic relatedness to a loving mother who makes one feel safe and secure—is the cause of developmental arrests. Much of normal behavior, as well as many clinical phenomena, such as those observed in neurosis, psychosis, and addiction, can be understood as the ego’s attempts to preserve a sense of safety (Sandler, 2003).
The paper argues that our need for a caretaking maternal figure is so profound that if we do not experience a nurturing figure in our “real” life relationships, we invent her in our minds. We then become attached to this internal image that our fantasy created. At times, holding on to an idealized created image may be a key for adaptation—a transitional object which facilitates a healthier developmental trajectory that allows one to transcend a reality of maternal deprivation. It can become a safe base from which to explore the world, and a safe haven to return to when distress and disappointment permeate real life. It can promote ego development by facilitating identification with a benign ego ideal and provides “potent assurance” rather than “omnipotent reassurance” (Alvarez, 1992, p.119) guaranteeing everlasting security. An idealizing fantasy can be viewed as a mental activity designed to overcome pain rather than deny it. The paper concludes with two case illustrations.