Due forme di internalizzazione religiosa nei giovani italiani: antecedenti e impatto sugli atteggiamenti intergruppi

[Autom. eng. transl.] The research that addresses the impact of religiosity on individual and social life often leads to controversial results, due to the difficulty of outlining and measuring empirically different forms of religious identity. The present contribution shows a possible distinction based on the concept of religious internalization (Ryan, Rigby & King, 1993) which involves two forms of religiosity: identification and introjection. An empirical research on a sample of 520 young Italians investigates the family antecedents (promotion of autonomy, setting an example, conditioned affection) of these two forms of religiosity and their impact on intergroup attitudes. Participants responded to an online self-report questionnaire. The results show that parenting behaviors effectively predict the different internalization of religion and that the two different forms of religiosity have a significant impact on intergroup attitudes. In particular, religious identification improves attitudes towards other groups, through the mediation of the adoption of pro-social values; on the contrary, religious introjection has a negative effect on outcomes, mediated by conformism. In conclusion, this research highlights how it is possible to distinguish two forms of religious identity based on the different internalization of religion by young people and predicted by specific family antecedents, and how this distinction sheds new light on the complex relationship between religiosity and prejudice, highlighting the role of mediation carried out by the different values adopted in the two forms of religiosity.