religious discrimination research paper

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• v.15; 2021 Sep

The association between experiences of religious discrimination, social-emotional and sleep outcomes among youth in Australia

Mienah z. sharif.

a Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice and Health, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA, USA

b Centre for Social Research and Methods, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia

Mandy Truong

c School of Nursing and Midwifery, Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences, Monash University, Clayton, Australia

Oishee Alam

d Religion and Society Research Centre, Western Sydney University, Sydney, Australia

e School of Social Sciences, Western Sydney University, Sydney, Australia

Jacqueline Nelson

f School of Communications, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, University of Technology Sydney, Australia

Anne Kavanagh

g Disability and Health Unit, Centre for Health Equity, Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia

Yin Paradies

h Faculty of Arts and Education, Deakin University, Burwood, Australia

Naomi Priest

i Murdoch Children's Research Institute, Melbourne, Australia

Religious-based hate crimes are on the rise worldwide. However, the relationship of religious discrimination on health and well-being, especially earlier on the lifecourse, is largely understudied. This study examines the prevalence of religious discrimination and the relationship it has on social-emotional adjustment and sleep outcomes among a diverse sample of students in Australia.

Data came from Speak Out Against Racism, a population-representative cross-sectional study of 4664 public school students in grades 5–9 in Australia in 2017. An adaption of the Adolescent Discrimination Distress Index (ADDI), was used to derive four measures of religious discrimination (peer, school, societal and the sum of those as a “total” score). The Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire measured the total difficulties, conduct, emotional, and prosocial behavior subscales. Measures of sleep outcomes included duration, latency, and disruption.

27 % (95 % CI 22.82, 31.12) of students reported experiences of direct total religious discrimination with higher levels being reported by students identifying as a religious minority. There was strong evidence that experiences of religious discrimination (across all four sources) was related to all measures of socioemotional adjustment and sleep outcomes.

Religious discrimination is an understudied form of social disadvantage that has implications for adolescents’ development, health and well-being. Conclusion: More programs, particularly in the school-context, address religious-based discrimination may reduce inequities in health.

• • There is a noted gap in population health research examining how religion operates as a structural determinant of health.
• • The relationship between discrimination and indicators of health and wellbeing have been understudied among young children.
• • Religious discrimination is associated with poor indicators of social-emotional adjustment across all four measures.
• • Religious discrimination is associated with adverse sleep outcomes (duration and latency) among young school-aged children.

1. Introduction

Reports of religious discrimination are on the rise, around the world, and is a dominant topic in political discourse particularly in settler-colonial contexts including the United States (U.S.) and Australia ( Guardian, 2020 ). In the US, religious-based hate crimes constitute 22 % of hate crimes, disproportionately affecting people of Jewish and Muslim faiths ( Ford, 2019 ). Anti-Muslim racism is a noted social issue both in the United States and in Australia, with increasing numbers of more serious, targeted incidents ( Dunn et al., 2016 ; Mansouri & Vergani, 2018 ) that has implications for health and health equity. With the rise in religious-based hate crime around the world, particularly related to Islamophobia ( Ford, 2019 ; Daulatzai & Rana, 2018 ) the problem of religious discrimination targeting religious minorities in the West shows no sign of abating. Therefore, examining the health impacts of religious discrimination is a population health priority.

To date, quantitative research on religion and health has primarily conceptualized religion as a protective, or health promoting, factor and has focused on individual-level factors including religious participation or religious coping ( Klocker et al., 2011 ). This work has documented positive implications of religious participation and/or religiosity. Higher degrees of religious participation and/or religiosity are associated with a wide range of positive mental health outcomes including less depressive symptoms ( Mouzon, 2017 ), lower levels of serious psychological distress ( Chatters et al., 2015 ) and overall lower mortality risk ( George et al., 2002 ).

However, given the global rise in religious-based hate crimes a noticeable gap in the scientific literature is the multiple directions by which religion can influence health. Religion can simultaneously be a protective factor and “the social problem itself”, that is, a social identity that can lead to discrimination, particularly for religious minorities, and/or can be manipulated (by some) to justify the mistreatment or exclusion of others, such as through patriarchal beliefs that promote subjugation of women or dismissal of science ( Popescu et al., 2009 ). The ways in which religion can be a source of potential risk to some groups’ wellbeing, but also a potential benefit, is a research priority. Religious discrimination represents how religion may become problematic for health, particularly for marginalized religious groups. However, the extant empirical research on religion and population health remains emergent, particularly among adolescents ( Kawachi, 2020 ; VanderWeele & Chen, 2019 ). Adolescence is an important developmental phase for examining these relationships given the salience of this period to identity formation, development of norms and values that can in turn influence behavior and lifestyle habits, as well as being a time of major biological growth and social role change ( Hope et al., 2017 ).

Existing research on discrimination and adolescent health has predominantly focused on racial discrimination, and on mental health outcomes, with strong associations documented. The extent to which these associations exist for religious discrimination merits investigation. Moreover, although indicators of social emotional adjustment have been more widely studied within adolescent health research, there is burgeoning interest in sleep and sleep hygiene (behaviours that promote optimum development) as they are essential for daily functioning and health development ( Priest et al., 2020 ; Yip, 2015 ; Yip et al., 2020 ). Sleep can act as either a risk or protective factor for a myriad of outcomes critical for adolescent wellbeing. For example, sleep disturbance is associated with poorer physical and psychological health outcomes. There is also growing evidence of associations with cardiovascular disease risk ( Matthews & Pantesco, 2016 ; Priest et al., 2020 ).

Sleep is vital for health, well-being and cognitive functioning and therefore optimizing sleep behavior is becoming a growing public health priority. Moreover, poor sleep patterns (e.g. deficiency and sleep disorders) are common among children and young people ( Keyes et al., 2015 ) and there is evidence doucmenting variations in sleep patterns among children by race and ethnicity ( Hawkins & Takeuchi, 2016 ), with children from minoritized groups experiencing poorer sleep-associated health outcomes than their white peers ( Guglielmo et al., 2018 ). A study of Australian children found that direct and vicarious experiences of racial discrimination were associated with sleep duration, sleep latency and sleep disruption ( Priest et al., 2020 ). Among a diverse sample of American adolescents, discrimination was found to be associated with sleep disturbance, with ethnic and racial identity buffering the impact of discrimination on sleep ( Yip et al., 2020 ). Furthermore, a recent systematic review ( Cave et al., 2020 ) found that sleep duration was also a mediating variable along the pathway from racial discrimination to subsequent health outcomes. This demonstrates that more research is needed to understand the relationship between sleep and experiences of discrimination.

1.1. Overview of the study

This current study addresses these gaps in the literature by examining a) the prevalence of religious discrimination by religious affiliation and b) the relationship between religious discrimination and sleep quality and social emotional adjustment among a large, population representative ethnically diverse sample of school-aged adolescents in two of the largest states in Australia. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people comprise 3.3 % of the total Australian population ( Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2017 ). Moreover, Australia is undergoing major demographic changes contributing to the multi-ethnic composition of the population, with half (49 %) of respondents either born overseas or had a parent born outside Australia ( ABS, 2017 ). About one-fifth (21 %) of the population speaks a language other than English at home. Religious diversity is growing in Australia; while many identify as Christian (52 %), a growing proportion of the population identify with “no religion” (30 %) and Islam and Buddhism are emerging as the second and third largest non-Christian religions ( Bouma & Halafoff, 2017 ).

Data came from the Speak Out Against Racism (SOAR) 2017 Student Survey, a population representative, cross-sectional study of 4664 public school students in grades 5–9 (10–15 years of age) in two Australian states: New South Wales and Victoria. The self-administered survey covered a range of topics including: socio-demographic characteristics, health behaviors, perceptions of the school climate (e.g. perceived connectedness at school and with peers). In addition, this survey examined students’ experiences of discrimination based on their race/ethnicity, gender and religion as well as their attitudes towards race- and religion-based bullying among peers. Data were collected at 23 schools between May and August 2017 by trained researchers.

Details on the selection of schools is provided elsewhere ( Priest et al., 2019 ). However, in brief, a list of government schools was obtained from each state's education department and schools were then stratified based on their proportion of: 1) Indigenous students and 2) students who spoke a language other than English. Schools with high proportions of Indigenous students were oversampled. Parental consent and student assent were required for participation and principals' approval from each school was obtained. Ethics committee approval was obtained from the Blinded for Review and from Blinded for Review.

Weights were created to adjust the sample to be representative of the government school student population in each state and to account for clustering at the school level. Weights were calculated for each responding student using the raking weighting method ( Priest et al., 2019 ). implemented in statistical program R. A design weight was assigned for each respondent as the inverse of their chance of being selected to take part in the survey. The base weights were adjusted so that the relative frequencies of selected characteristics among respondents matched the population frequencies. The characteristics for which the adjustments were carried out were those involved in the selection process – Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander tertile, Language Background Other than English, Occupation and Education Index category, and part of state (metropolitan, versus rest of state) ( Priest et al., 2019 ).

2.1. Outcomes

2.1.1. social emotional adjustment.

The Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) is a brief questionnaire assessing the psychological adjustment of children and youth ( Goodman, 2001 ). The youth SDQ (for children ages 11–17) consists of 25 items across five subscales. To provide a holistic profile of social-emotional adjustment, we included indicators of both optimal and adverse outcomes: 1) total difficulties, conduct and emotional scales indicative of externalizing and internalizing problems, respectively ( Bayer et al., 2011 ) and 2) prosocial behavior indicative of child's positive social-emotional adjustment. The SDQ is not intended to be used as a diagnostic instrument; it indicates problematic emotions and behaviors across a range from normative to highly elevated ( Stone et al., 2010 ) While cut-points have been developed for the SDQ these have not been validated for ethnic minority youth. Therefore, continuous scores are used for the current study following previous approaches in this study population and context ( Priest et al., 2020 ).

2.1.2. Sleep

Sleep duration was measured by students' response to a question about what time they fall asleep and wake up on a usual school day and on a non-school day. Sleep duration was calculated as the difference between reported sleep time and reported wake-up time, separately for school and non-school days. Analysis was restricted to sleep durations between 2.5 h and 20 h ( Paine & Gander, 2016 ) which included 99.7 % of observations (n = 9 school day and n = 19 non-school day observations were excluded from analysis). Sleep difficulties were measured by examining sleep latency and sleep disruption . Sleep latency was measured using a single item “During the last four weeks, how long did it usually take for you to fall asleep”. A 3-category analytic variable was created: 0–30, 30–60, >60 min. Sleep disruption was measured using a single item ‘During the past four weeks, how often did you awaken during your sleep time and have trouble falling back to sleep again?’ A 3-category analytic variable was created: none/a little, some/a good bit, most/all. These items have previously been used with children and adolescents from diverse ethnic backgrounds ( Paine & Gander, 2016 ).

2.2. Exposures

2.2.1. experiences of religious discrimination.

Experiences of religious discrimination were measured using 10 items drawn from the Adolescent Discrimination Distress Index (ADDI)( Fisher et al., 2000 ) and two items used in a study on racism and racial attitudes among Australian school students ( Priest et al., 2014 ) Items assessed discrimination by peers at school (4 items), by school personnel (3 items) and by others in the society (5 items). Each item was followed by the attribution (“because of …”) with “your religion” being one of three non-mutually exclusive options. Frequency of each experience was indicated from 0 = ‘this did not happen to me’, 1 = ‘once or twice’, 2 = ‘every few weeks’, 3 = ‘about once a week’, to 4 = ‘several times a week or more.’ Sub-scales were created for each source of discrimination (peer, school, societal) by calculating the mean score for relevant items as done previously ( Fisher et al., 2000 ). Lastly, a total score was calculated by taking the average of responses to all 12 items.

2.2.2. Covariates

Selection of covariates was based on theoretical and empirical studies and followed VanderWeele's definition of a confounder as a cause of exposure and/or outcome ( VanderWeele, 2019 ). Other than Indigenous background, race or ethnicity is not commonly collected in national data collection efforts in Australia, including the Census. Ethnicity was measured using a self-reported variable with categories developed for the study. Students were provided several racial/ethnic categories to choose from (including checking off multiple) as well as an open-ended ‘other’ category that was later back coded. Following international approaches ( Priest et al., 2019 ), a prioritization method was used to classify multiple responses to mutually exclusive categories based on level of stigmatization in Australia in the following order (Indigenous, Pacific Islander/Maori, Middle Eastern, African, Latinx, South Asian, East Asian, South East Asian, European and Anglo (White). Five per cent of students had missing ethnicity data due to ‘don't know’, unintelligible, or missing responses to this question. A ‘Missing’ ethnicity category was included in the analyses but estimates are not reported as meaningful interpretation was not possible. Due to very small numbers (n = 35) estimates for Latinx students are not reported. Gender was measured by response options: male, female and other. Country of birth was measured by dichotomizing whether students reported being born in Australia or in another (specified) country “Born outside Australia.” Religion was measured by the question: “What is your religion, even if you are not currently practicing?” Responses were combined into the following four categories: 1) No Religion 2) Christianity, 3) Islam, 4) Buddhism, 5) Hinduism and 6) Other. The “Other” category was comprised of a total of 18 religious groups and were aggregated due to the cell sizes within each group. Each student's grade was provided by the school. Index of Socioeconomic Advantage (ICSEA) is a continuous, composite variable comprised of parental occupation and education and school factors such as geographical location and proportion of Indigenous students ( ACARA, 2013 ).

2.3. Analysis plan

Bivariate analyses (e.g. t-tests for continuous outcomes including SDQ and sleep duration and crosstabs for categorical outcomes including sleep latency and sleep disruption) were conducted to estimate the prevalence of key study variables by religious affiliation. Next, a series of regression models were fitted to examine the relationship between self-reported religious discrimination (peer, school, societal, total) and socioemotional (total difficulties, conduct, emotional, prosocial) and sleep outcomes (sleep duration, sleep latency, sleep disruption).

Linear regression models were fitted for socioemotional adjustment (continuous total difficulties, conduct, emotional, and prosocial scores) and sleep duration (continuous duration of sleep in minutes). Multinomial regression models were fitted and parametrized in terms of relative risk ratios for sleep latency (0–30 min vs 30–60 and 60 min) and sleep disruption (none/a little vs some/a good bit, and most/all trouble falling back to sleep). Unadjusted models examined the crude association between each racial discrimination exposure and each outcome. Next, models were further adjusted for gender, ethnicity, country of birth, year level and school socioeconomic background. As evidence suggests sleep problems may be on the causal pathway between discrimination and mental health, sleep was not included as a covariate in the socioemotional adjustment models.

All analyses were conducted in Stata version 15 using the ‘svy’ commands to account for the sampling weights and clustering at the school level.

The socio-demographic characteristics ( Table 1 ) demonstrate the diverse ethnic and religious composition of the sample. In parallel to the recent Census among adults ( ABS, 2017 ), the largest proportion (approximately 56 %) of students identified as Anglo (40.0 %; 95 % CI 30.6, 49.1) or European (15.8 %; 95 % CI 12.3, 18.8). However, there was a diverse composition of students identifying with a non-Anglo/European ethnic group including: 4.6 % Indigenous (95 % CI 2.6, 8.0), 3.6 % Pacific/Maori (95 % CI 2.1, 6.3), 5.7 % Middle Eastern (95 % CI 3.6, 8.3), 4.1 % African (95 % CI 2.1, 4.7), 7.9 % East Asian (95 % CI (4.7, 12.3), 8.9 % South East Asian (95 % CI (3.0, 12.6) and 5.5 % South Asian (95 % CI 3.2, 9.0).

Key study variables in the speak out against racism (SOAR) study, overall and by religious affiliation (4,664).

Note: Percentages may not sum to 100 due to rounding.

When asked to report religious affiliation students largely reported “No Religion” (45.4 %; 95 % CI 33.2, 58.3) followed by Christianity (35.3 %; 95 % CI 28.7, 42.5), 6.2 % (95 % CI 1.4, 22.4) Buddhist, 4.9 % (95 % CI 2.9, 8.1) Muslim, 2.4 % (95 % CI 1.0, 5.6) Hindu and 1.7 % (95 % CI 1.0, 2.8) “Other.” Approximately 17 % of students (95 % CI 13.2, 21.0) were born overseas. It is noteworthy to highlight that a large proportion of students from non-Christian religious groups were foreign-born. Specifically, 46 % (95 % CI 26.4, 66.3) of Muslim, 24.5 % (95 % CI 12.3, 42.8) of Buddhist, 47 % (95 % CI 34.1, 60.3) of Hindu and 55.9 % (95 % CI 29.9, 70.9) of students identifying with an “Other” religion were born outside of Australia.

Overall, over a quarter (26.7 %; 95 % CI 22.8, 31.1) of students reported experiences of direct total religious discrimination, including direct experiences from peers (21.3 % 95 % CI 18.0, 25.2), school (10.5 %; 95 % CI 7.3, 3.7) and societal (16.3 % 95 % CI 14.2, 19.4) sources. Across all sources of religious discrimination, far greater proportions of students who identified as Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu or Other, reported religious discrimination experiences than those students who identified with the dominant “No Religion” group (see Table 1 ).

There was strong evidence that experiences of religious discrimination across all four sources was related to socioemotional adjustment, after adjusting for socio-demographic characteristics ( Table 2 ). In other words, each increase in frequency of total direct religious discrimination was associated with an increase of 3.7 (95 % CI 2.8, 4.5) in total difficulty scores. This effect was also detected when examining emotional symptoms, such that each increase in frequency of reporting experiencing total direct religious discrimination was associated with an increase of 0.9 in the score measuring (adverse) emotional symptoms (b = 0.9, 95 % CI 0.6, 1.2), and also with an increase in the score measuring conduct problems (b = 1.0, 95 % CI 0.6, 1.4). However, an increase in reporting religious discriminatory experience was associated with a decrease of 0.3 (95 % CI -0.5, −0.1) in the score assessing prosocial behavior.

Estimates from linear regression models showing associations between self-reported religious discrimination and socioemotional adjustment in the Speak Out Against Racism (SOAR) Study (N = 4480).

# Adjusted for ethnicity, gender, religion, school year, country of birth, ICSEA.

Strong evidence was also found for an effect of direct religious discrimination across almost all sleep outcomes. An increase in the frequency of reporting experiencing religious discrimination, across all four sources of discrimination, was associated with shorter sleep duration on school days ( Table 3 ). For example, after adjusting for socio-demographic characteristics, each 1-point increase in total direct religious discrimination was associated with approximately 20 (b = 19.8, 95 % CI -36.0, −3.6) fewer minutes of sleep on a school day. However, there were no associations between any of the measures of religious discrimination on sleep duration on non-school days ( Table 3 ). Similarly, after adjusting for socio-demographic characteristics, each 1-point increase in total direct religious discrimination was associated with 1.7 times the risk of (95 % CI 1.3, 2.2) sleep latency greater than 60 min in comparison to sleep latency spanning 0–30 min ( Table 4 ). Lastly, after controlling for socio-demographic characteristics, a 1-point increase in total direct experiences of religious discrimination was associated with 2.4 the risk (95 % CI 1.3, 4.4) of reporting sleep disruption most or all of the time in comparison to none of the time or a little of the time ( Table 4 ).

Estimates from linear regression models showing associations between self-reported religious discrimination and sleep duration in the Speak Out Against Racism (SOAR) Study (N = 3997).

Multinomial logistic regression showing associations between self-reported religious discrimination and sleep difficulties in the Speak Out Against Racism (SOAR) Study (N = 4118).

# Adjusted for ethnicity, gender, religion, country of birth and ICSEA.

4. Discussion

The goal of this study was to build on the understudied relationship between religious discrimination and indicators of adolescent health and wellbeing including social emotional adjustment and sleep behaviors. Within the study's sample, over one-quarter (27 %) of students reported experiencing total religious discrimination. Students from minoritized religious groups (e.g. Islam, Buddhism) reported higher levels of discrimination across all sources than their peers who identified as either “no religion” or Christian.

The results suggest that religious discrimination had a deleterious impact on the health and wellbeing of adolescents, irrespective of whether it was from peers, elsewhere in the school, or from wider societal interactions. An increase in experiences of religious discrimination (across all four sources) was associated with an increase in total difficulties, emotional symptoms, and conduct problems but negatively associated with prosocial behavior. Our findings are consistent with, but also add to, the existing body of literature on the adverse impact of racial discrimination on indicators of social-emotional wellbeing outcomes among adolescents ( Cogburn et al., 2011 ; Priest et al., 2020 ). For example, in a recent study of adolescents in the U.S., religious discrimination had a negative impact on the psychological and mental health of adolescents identifying with a marginalized religious and racial and ethnic minority group ( Balkaya et al., 2019 ).

To our knowledge, this is the first study to examine the relationship between religious discrimination and sleep behavior among adolescents. Experiences of religious discrimination were associated with fewer minutes of sleep on school days only. In addition, an increase in reported experiences of religious discrimination was associated with higher risk of sleep latency as well as higher risk of frequent sleep disruptions. Our findings align with several studies documenting negative associations between racial discrimination and sleep quality ( Majeno et al., 2018 ; Zeiders, 2017 ). For example, among a sample of ethnically diverse adolescents experiences of discrimination, whether attributed to ethnicity or other characteristics, was found to be negatively associated with perceived sleep quality, particularly sleep disturbances ( Majeno et al., 2018 ). Thus, other forms of discrimination, not just discrimination attributed to one's ethnicity, are detrimental to sleep quality.

There is growing interest in examining how the school social environment can have implications for students' wellbeing and health ( Carta et al., 2015 ; Eccles & Roeser, 2012 ; Powell et al., 2018 ). And in the current study, an interesting relationship emerged between religious discrimination and fewer minutes slept held true on school days, but not on non-school days. A prior study among Mexican-origin young adults in the United States described that fluctuations in sleep may be impacted by experiences of discrimination across different settings (e.g. school, community) that can activate feelings of threat or arousal thereby impeding sleep on some nights and cause need for catch up sleep on other nights ( Zeiders, 2017 ). Moreover, the author hypothesized that perceived discrimination experienced at school elicits “rumination processes and or vigilance against threat” which can disrupt sleep patterns and quality ( Zeiders, 2017 ). Thus, a school setting that is hostile, or discriminatory, to students from certain religious backgrounds could be one contributing factor to the patterns in our sample such that the students who experience more religious discrimination at school have poorer sleep quality on school days than on non-school days. Moreover, it could be that the non-school days provide these students with more time in other contexts (e.g. home or community) in which their religious identities are affirmed and/or not threatened which then can promote optimal sleep practices. This aligns with a recent study in the U.S. ( Montoro et al., 2021 ) that found a negative impact of experiences of racial discrimination at school on student's sense of belonging and their academic performance. Thus, the current study adds to the growing body of literature emphasizing the critical role the school environment can be for increasing exposure to risk factors, such as discrimination, that have implications for childrens' development and health ( Eccles & Roeser, 2012 ; Huang et al., 2013 ) considering the large proportion of time youth spend at school ( Carta et al., 2015 ; Powell et al., 2018 ). Specifically, the findings provide evidence on how religious discrimination within the school context is associated with shorter sleep duration, an understudied outcome among child health disparities research.

4.1. Implications for future research and practice

Overall, our findings support the growing evidence that stressors within the social environment, including religious discrimination, impact adolescent health and development and that ongoing research is needed that takes a holistic approach, examining multiple outcomes, towards investigating these relationships. The results, together with the global rise in religion-based hate crimes, underscore the need for more research conceptualizing and addressing religious discrimination as a form of stress that poses risks to population health and health disparities, and especially so among religious minorities in Western contexts. For example, a study among British Muslim school students argued that racism experienced by Muslim students often included accounts of religious discrimination, something which is not often considered in discussions and scholarship about racism ( Gilbert, 2004 ) and health. Additionally, future research is needed to help delineate the pathways in the observed association between discriminatory experiences within the school context and sleep behavior. Future research can also guide the development of anti-discriminatory programs and policies within the school setting that create learning environments that are supportive and inclusive to students of all religious and racial/ethnic backgrounds.

4.2. Limitations

There are limitations to the study that should be considered when interpreting findings. First, the data are all based on students’ self-report and are therefore subject to biases including social desirability and recall. More objective measures of sleep and social emotional adjustment would have bolstered the data as would have student-level data measuring their socioeconomic background. Also, there are additional, unmeasured, factors that this study did not include (e.g. religiosity) that could influence the main relationship of interest. Third, the study is cross-sectional and therefore is limited in testing potential pathways between discrimination, sleep and social-emotional outcomes and determining the directionality of relationships.

5. Conclusion

Albeit understudied, religious discrimination is a highly prevalent form of everyday social disadvantage that has implications for health and should be more strongly considered in population health research. This study is one of the first to document a relationship between religious discrimination and two indicators of health and wellbeing among adolescents: social emotional adjustment and sleep. The results clearly signify the urgent need for more research, policies and programs to curtail the impact religious based discrimination can have on adolescent health and development.

Author statement

Sharif led the conceptualization, supervision and writing of the manuscript. Priest led the formal analyses. All authors contributed to the writing, review and editing of the manuscript.

Ethical statement

None of the authors have any conflicts of interest to disclose. All authors were involved in the various stages of manuscript preparation and they have all approved the submitted manuscript.

Speak out Against Racism (SOAR) was conducted in partnership with the New South Wales and Victorian education departments and the Australian Human Rights commission. The study sponsors had no role in study design; the collection, analysis, and interpretation of data; the writing of the report; or the decision to submit the manuscript for publication. The authors would like to thank all schools and students participating in SOAR. We thank Tania King for her work during the early stages of SOAR and research staff (Rebecca Moorhead, Sharon Moorhead, Brandi Fox, Meiliasari Meiliasari and Emma Whatman (Victoria); and Oishee Alam, Alexia Derbas, Katie Blair, Rosalie Atie and Zarlasht Sarwari (New South Wales)) who were involved in data collection. We acknowledge the support of the Social Research Centre with data collection.

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Religious discrimination against minorities: theories and findings, 1. introduction, 2. religion and discrimination, 3. a systemist approach to an analysis of religious discrimination, 4. conclusions, institutional review board statement, informed consent statement, data availability statement, conflicts of interest.

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Akbaba, Y. Religious Discrimination against Minorities: Theories and Findings. Soc. Sci. 2023 , 12 , 522. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci12090522

Akbaba Y. Religious Discrimination against Minorities: Theories and Findings. Social Sciences . 2023; 12(9):522. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci12090522

Akbaba, Yasemin. 2023. "Religious Discrimination against Minorities: Theories and Findings" Social Sciences 12, no. 9: 522. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci12090522

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Religious Discrimination in the Workplace: A Review and Examination of Current and Future Trends

• Published: 15 March 2013
• Volume 28 , pages 439–454, ( 2013 )

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• Sonia Ghumman 1 ,
• Ann Marie Ryan 2 ,
• Lizabeth A. Barclay 3 &
• Karen S. Markel 3  

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Over the last decade, religious discrimination claims have risen more rapidly compared to most other protected categories under the Civil Rights Act (CRA). The goal of this review paper is to summarize the psychological and HR practitioner-focused research on religious discrimination as it relates to the CRA to understand these religious discrimination claims. In doing so, this review also highlights what future research is needed, and what the challenges and practical implications of religious discrimination are for managers.

Design/methodology/approach

We conduct a systematic literature review of the psychology and business research on religious discrimination.

Building from the literature review and case law, we highlight four trends that contribute to religious discrimination in the workplace: (1) legal ambiguities, (2) increased religious diversity in the American workforce, (3) increasing expression of religious beliefs, and (4) the unique nature of religion.

Implications

The trends identified in our review paper highlight the need for employers to understand and address religious discrimination issues in the workplace and the lack of empirical research in this area points to a critical gap in our understanding of workplace religious discrimination that warrants future research.

Originality/value

In addition to highlighting trends that contribute to religious discrimination in the workplace, this literature review addresses where there are gaps in the existing research that call for further research and offers practical implications for employers and organizations.

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Examining the effects of exposure to religion in the workplace on perceptions of religious discrimination.

Religious Diversity at Workplace: a Literature Review

Religion and Equality in the Workplace: A Legal-Philosophical Analysis

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The Right to Freedom of Religion and the Right Against Religious Discrimination: Theoretical Distinctions

International Journal of Constitutional Law (Forthcoming 2019)

Oxford Legal Studies Research Paper No. 14/2019

U of Melbourne Legal Studies Research Paper No. 894

20 Pages Posted: 17 Jun 2020 Last revised: 31 Jul 2020

Tarunabh Khaitan

London School of Economics - Law School

Jane Calderwood Norton

University of Auckland - Faculty of Law

Date Written: October 28, 2018

This article argues that while they are often conflated, the right to freedom of religion and the right against religious discrimination are in fact distinct human rights. Religious freedom is best understood as protecting our interest in religious adherence (and non-adherence), understood from the committed perspective of the (non)adherent. This internal, committed, perspective generates a capacious and realistic conception of religious adherence, which reflects the staggering plurality of forms of religiosity (or lack thereof) as extant in contemporary societies. The right against religious discrimination is best understood as protecting our non-committal interest in the unsaddled membership of our religious group. Thus understood, the two rights have distinct normative rationales. Religious freedom is justified by the need to respect our decisional autonomy in matters of religious adherence. The prohibition on religious discrimination is justified by the need to reduce any significant (political, sociocultural, or material) advantage gaps between different religious groups. These differences reveal a complex map of two overlapping, but conceptually distinct, human rights which are not necessarily breached simultaneously.

Keywords: religious freedom, discrimination law, human rights law, religious interests, religious adherence, religious group membership

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Discrimination Against Religious Minorities

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Elina Schleutker, Discrimination Against Religious Minorities, Journal of Church and State , Volume 61, Issue 2, Spring 2019, Pages 282–307, https://doi.org/10.1093/jcs/csy031

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Introduction

Minority religions have often suffered from discrimination and persecution. Such discrimination has taken place across different geographical locations, independently from the creed of the minority and majority religions. The guilty party may be the government, paramilitary groups, or even the society at large. To name some examples, a word as strong as genocide has been employed to describe the atrocities by ISIS against Yazidis, Shias, Christians, and other religious minorities. 1 Of the 45 European countries in 2015, social hostilities towards Muslims, Christians, and Jews took place in 32, 21, and 33 countries respectively. 2 In Myanmar, the Muslim Rohingya has been persecuted for decades. For example, their citizenship is denied, their freedom of movement has been restricted, and also prior to the 2016 and 2017 atrocities, military operations and sectarian violence have forced thousands to flee. 3

Several interest groups, such as Open Doors, 4 Shia Rights Watch, 5 and the International Humanist and Ethical Union 6 have documented this discrimination and aimed to bring it into the political arena. Yet, in academia there are only a handful of quantitative studies that investigate the determinants of discrimination 7 and religious persecution. 8 These studies have a global focus and they point out factors such as the level of democracy, supportive policies towards the majority religion, social regulation of religion, experiences with communist rule, as well as the independence of judiciaries as determinants of the cross-country variation in minority religion discrimination. In other words, the scope of the studies and the selection of the independent variables closely follow the research design of the studies on government regulation of religion. 9

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Religion in India: Tolerance and Segregation

1. religious freedom, discrimination and communal relations, table of contents.

• The dimensions of Hindu nationalism in India
• India’s Muslims express pride in being Indian while identifying communal tensions, desiring segregation
• Muslims, Hindus diverge over legacy of Partition
• Religious conversion in India
• Religion very important across India’s religious groups
• Near-universal belief in God, but wide variation in how God is perceived
• Across India’s religious groups, widespread sharing of beliefs, practices, values
• Religious identity in India: Hindus divided on whether belief in God is required to be a Hindu, but most say eating beef is disqualifying
• Sikhs are proud to be Punjabi and Indian
• Most Indians say they and others are very free to practice their religion
• Most people do not see evidence of widespread religious discrimination in India
• Most Indians report no recent discrimination based on their religion
• In Northeast India, people perceive more religious discrimination
• Most Indians see communal violence as a very big problem in the country
• Indians divided on the legacy of Partition for Hindu-Muslim relations
• More Indians say religious diversity benefits their country than say it is harmful
• Indians are highly knowledgeable about their own religion, less so about other religions
• Substantial shares of Buddhists, Sikhs say they have worshipped at religious venues other than their own
• One-in-five Muslims in India participate in celebrations of Diwali
• Members of both large and small religious groups mostly keep friendships within religious lines
• Most Indians are willing to accept members of other religious communities as neighbors, but many express reservations
• Indians generally marry within same religion
• Most Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs and Jains strongly support stopping interreligious marriage
• India’s religious groups vary in their caste composition
• Indians in lower castes largely do not perceive widespread discrimination against their groups
• Most Indians do not have recent experience with caste discrimination
• Most Indians OK with Scheduled Caste neighbors
• Indians generally do not have many close friends in different castes
• Large shares of Indians say men, women should be stopped from marrying outside of their caste
• Most Indians say being a member of their religious group is not only about religion
• Common ground across major religious groups on what is essential to religious identity
• India’s religious groups vary on what disqualifies someone from their religion
• Hindus say eating beef, disrespecting India, celebrating Eid incompatible with being Hindu
• Muslims place stronger emphasis than Hindus on religious practices for identity
• Many Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists do not identify with a sect
• Sufism has at least some followers in every major Indian religious group
• Large majorities say Indian culture is superior to others
• What constitutes ‘true’ Indian identity?
• Large gaps between religious groups in 2019 election voting patterns
• No consensus on whether democracy or strong leader best suited to lead India
• Majorities support politicians being involved in religious matters
• Indian Muslims favor their own religious courts; other religious groups less supportive
• Most Indians do not support allowing triple talaq for Muslims
• Southern Indians least likely to say religion is very important in their life
• Most Indians give to charitable causes
• Majorities of Hindus, Muslims, Christians and Jains in India pray daily
• More Indians practice puja at home than at temple
• Most Hindus do not read or listen to religious books frequently
• Most Indians have an altar or shrine in their home for worship
• Religious pilgrimages common across most religious groups in India
• Most Hindus say they have received purification from a holy body of water
• Roughly half of Indian adults meditate at least weekly
• Only about a third of Indians ever practice yoga
• Nearly three-quarters of Christians sing devotionally
• Most Muslims and few Jains say they have participated in or witnessed animal sacrifice for religious purposes
• Most Indians schedule key life events based on auspicious dates
• About half of Indians watch religious programs weekly
• For Hindus, nationalism associated with greater religious observance
• Indians value marking lifecycle events with religious rituals
• Most Indian parents say they are raising their children in a religion
• Fewer than half of Indian parents say their children receive religious instruction outside the home
• Vast majority of Sikhs say it is very important that their children keep their hair long
• Half or more of Hindus, Muslims and Christians wear religious pendants
• Most Hindu, Muslim and Sikh women cover their heads outside the home
• Slim majority of Hindu men say they wear a tilak, fewer wear a janeu
• Eight-in-ten Muslim men in India wear a skullcap
• Majority of Sikh men wear a turban
• Muslim and Sikh men generally keep beards
• Most Indians are not vegetarians, but majorities do follow at least some restrictions on meat in their diet
• One-in-five Hindus abstain from eating root vegetables
• Fewer than half of vegetarian Hindus willing to eat in non-vegetarian settings
• Indians evenly split about willingness to eat meals with hosts who have different religious rules about food
• Majority of Indians say they fast
• More Hindus say there are multiple ways to interpret Hinduism than say there is only one true way
• Most Indians across different religious groups believe in karma
• Most Hindus, Jains believe in Ganges’ power to purify
• Belief in reincarnation is not widespread in India
• More Hindus and Jains than Sikhs believe in moksha (liberation from the cycle of rebirth)
• Most Hindus, Muslims, Christians believe in heaven
• Nearly half of Indian Christians believe in miracles
• Most Muslims in India believe in Judgment Day
• Most Indians believe in fate, fewer believe in astrology
• Many Hindus and Muslims say magic, witchcraft or sorcery can influence people’s lives
• Roughly half of Indians trust religious ritual to treat health problems
• Lower-caste Christians much more likely than General Category Christians to hold both Christian and non-Christian beliefs
• Nearly all Indians believe in God
• Few Indians believe ‘there are many gods’
• Many Hindus feel close to Shiva
• Many Indians believe God can be manifested in other people
• Indians almost universally ask God for good health, prosperity, forgiveness
• Acknowledgments
• Questionnaire design
• Sample design and weighting
• Precision of estimates
• Response rates
• Significant events during fieldwork
• Appendix B: Index of religious segregation

Indians generally see high levels of religious freedom in their country. Overwhelming majorities of people in each major religious group, as well as in the overall public, say they are “very free” to practice their religion. Smaller shares, though still majorities within each religious community, say people of other religions also are very free to practice their religion. Relatively few Indians – including members of religious minority communities – perceive religious discrimination as widespread.

At the same time, perceptions of discrimination vary a great deal by region. For example, Muslims in the Central region of the country are generally less likely than Muslims elsewhere to say there is a lot of religious discrimination in India. And Muslims in the North and Northeast are much more likely than Muslims in other regions to report that they, personally, have experienced recent discrimination.

Indians also widely consider communal violence to be an issue of national concern (along with other problems, such as unemployment and corruption). Most people across different religious backgrounds, education levels and age groups say communal violence is a very big problem in India.

The partition of the Indian subcontinent in 1947 remains a subject of disagreement. Overall, the survey finds mixed views on whether the establishment of Hindu-majority India and Muslim-majority Pakistan alleviated communal tensions or stoked them. On balance, Muslims tend to see Partition as a “bad thing” for Hindu-Muslim relations, while Hindus lean slightly toward viewing it as a “good thing.”

The vast majority of Indians say they are very free today to practice their religion (91%), and all of India’s major religious groups share this sentiment: Roughly nine-in-ten Buddhists (93%), Hindus (91%), Muslims (89%) and Christians (89%) say they are very free to practice their religion, as do 85% of Jains and 82% of Sikhs.

Broadly speaking, Indians are more likely to view themselves as having a high degree of religious freedom than to say that people of other religions are very free to practice their faiths. Still, 79% of the overall public – and about two-thirds or more of the members of each of the country’s major religious communities – say that people belonging to other religions are very free to practice their faiths in India today.

Generally, these attitudes do not vary substantially among Indians of different ages, educational backgrounds or geographic regions. Indians in the Northeast are somewhat less likely than those elsewhere to see widespread religious freedom for people of other faiths – yet even in the Northeast, a solid majority (60%) say there is a high level of religious freedom for other religious communities in India.

Most people in India do not see a lot of religious discrimination against any of the country’s six major religious groups. In general, Hindus, Muslims and Christians are slightly more likely to say there is a lot of discrimination against their own religious community than to say there is a lot of discrimination against people of other faiths. Still, no more than about one-quarter of the followers of any of the country’s major faiths say they face widespread discrimination.

Generally, Indians’ opinions about religious discrimination do not vary substantially by gender, age or educational background. For example, among college graduates, 19% say there is a lot of discrimination against Hindus, compared with 21% among adults with less education.

Within religious groups as well, people of different ages, as well as both men and women, tend to have similar opinions on religious discrimination.

However, there are large regional variations in perceptions of religious discrimination. For example, among Muslims who live in the Central part of the country, just one-in-ten say there is widespread discrimination against Muslims in India, compared with about one-third of those who live in the North (35%) and Northeast (31%). (For more information on measures of religious discrimination in the Northeast, see “ In Northeast India, people perceive more religious discrimination ” below.)

Among Muslims, perceptions of discrimination against their community can vary somewhat based on their level of religious observance. For instance, about a quarter of Muslims across the country who pray daily say there is a lot of discrimination against Muslims (26%), compared with 19% of Muslims nationwide who pray less often. This difference by observance is pronounced in the North, where 39% of Muslims who pray every day say there is a lot of discrimination against Muslims in India, roughly twice the share among those in the same region who pray less often (20%).

The survey also asked respondents about their personal experiences with discrimination. In all, 17% of Indians report facing recent discrimination based on their religion. Roughly one-in-five Muslims (21%) and 17% of Hindus say that in the last 12 months they themselves have faced discrimination because of their religion, as do 18% of Sikhs. By contrast, Christians are less likely to say they have felt discriminated against because of their religion (10%), and similar shares of Buddhists and Jains (13% each) fall into this category.

Nationally, men and women and people belonging to different age groups do not differ significantly from each other in their experiences with religious discrimination. People who have a college degree, however, are somewhat less likely than those with less formal schooling to say they have experienced religious discrimination in the past year.

Within religious groups, experiences with discrimination vary based on region of residence and other factors. Among Muslims, for instance, 40% of those living in Northern India and 36% in the Northeast say they have faced recent religious discrimination, compared with no more than one-in-five in the Southern, Central, Eastern and Western regions.

Experiences with religious discrimination also are more common among Muslims who are more religious and those who report recent financial hardship (that is, they have not been able to afford food, housing or medical care for themselves or their families in the last year).

Muslims who have a favorable view of the Indian National Congress party (INC) are more likely than Muslims with an unfavorable view of the party to say they have experienced religious discrimination (26% vs. 15%). Among Northern Muslims, those who have a favorable view of the INC are much more likely than those who don’t approve of the INC to say they have experienced discrimination (45% vs. 23%). (Muslims in the country, and especially Muslims in the North, tend to say they voted for the Congress party in the 2019 election. See Chapter 6 .)

Hindus with less education and those who have recently experienced poverty also are more likely to say they have experienced religious discrimination.

Less than 5% of India’s population lives in the eight isolated states of the country’s Northeastern region. This region broadly lags behind the country in economic development indicators. And this small segment of the population has a linguistic and religious makeup that differs drastically from the rest of the country.

According to the 2011 census of India, Hindus are still the majority religious group (58%), but they are less prevalent in the Northeast than elsewhere (81% nationally). The smaller proportion of Hindus there is offset by the highest shares of Christians (16% vs. 2% nationally) and Muslims (22% vs. 13% nationally) in any region. And based on the survey, the region also has a higher share of Scheduled Tribes than any other region in the country (25% vs. 9% nationally), and half of Scheduled Tribe members in the Northeast are Christians.

Indians in the Northeast are more likely than those elsewhere to perceive high levels of religious discrimination. For example, roughly four-in-ten in the region say there is a lot of discrimination against Muslims in India, about twice the share of North Indians who say the same thing (41% vs. 22%).

Much of the Northeast’s perception of high religious discrimination is driven by Hindus in the region. A slim majority of Northeastern Hindus (55%) say there is widespread discrimination against Hindus in India, while almost as many (53%) say Muslims face a lot of discrimination. Substantial shares of Hindus in the Northeast say other religious communities also face such mistreatment.

The region’s other religious communities are less likely to say there is religious discrimination in India. For example, while 44% of Northeastern Hindus say Christians face a lot of discrimination, only one-in-five Christians in the Northeast perceive this level of discrimination against their own group. By contrast, at the national level, Christians are more likely than Hindus to see a lot of discrimination against Christians (18% vs. 10%).

People in the Northeast also are more likely to report experiencing religious discrimination. While 17% of individuals nationally say they personally have felt religious discrimination in the last 12 months, one-third of those surveyed in the Northeast say they have had such an experience. Northeastern Hindus, in particular, are much more likely than Hindus elsewhere to report recent religious discrimination (37% vs. 17% nationally).

Most Indians (65%) say communal violence – a term broadly used to describe violence between religious groups – is a “very big problem” in their country (the term was not defined for respondents). This includes identical shares of Hindus and Muslims (65% each) who say this.

But even larger majorities identify several other national problems. Unemployment tops the list of national concerns, with 84% of Indians saying this is a very big problem. And roughly three-quarters of Indian adults see corruption (76%), crime (76%) and violence against women (75%) as very big national issues. (The survey was designed and mostly conducted before the World Health Organization declared the COVID-19 outbreak a pandemic.)

Indians across nearly every religious group, caste category and region consistently rank unemployment as the top national concern. Buddhists, who overwhelmingly belong to disadvantaged castes, widely rank unemployment as a major concern (86%), while just a slim majority see communal violence as a very big problem (56%).

Sikhs are more likely than other major religious groups in India to say communal violence is a major issue (78%). This concern is especially pronounced among college-educated Sikhs (87%).

Among Hindus, those who are more religious are more likely to see communal violence as a major issue: Fully 67% of Hindus who say religion is very important in their lives consider communal violence a major issue, compared with 58% among those who say religion is less important to them.

Indians in different regions of the country also differ in their concern about communal violence: Three-quarters of Indians in the Northeast say communal violence is a very big problem, compared with 59% in the West. Concerns about communal violence are widespread in the national capital of Delhi, where 78% of people say this is a major issue. During fieldwork for this study, major protests broke out in New Delhi (and elsewhere) following the BJP-led government’s passing of a new bill, which creates an expedited path to citizenship for immigrants from some neighboring countries – but not Muslims.

The end of Britain’s colonial rule in India, in 1947, was accompanied by the separation of Hindu-majority India from Muslim-majority Pakistan and massive migration in both directions. Nearly three-quarters of a century later, Indians are divided over the legacy of Partition.

About four-in-ten (41%) say the partition of India and Pakistan was a good thing for Hindu-Muslim relations, while a similar share (39%) say it was a bad thing. The rest of the population (20%) does not provide a clear answer, saying Partition was neither a good thing nor a bad thing, that it depends, or that they don’t know or cannot answer the question. There are no clear patterns by age, gender, education or party preference on opinions on this question.

Among Muslims, the predominant view is that Partition was a bad thing (48%) for Hindu-Muslim relations. Fewer see it as a good thing (30%). Hindus are more likely than Muslims to say Partition was a good thing for Hindu-Muslim relations (43%) and less likely to say it was a bad thing (37%).

Of the country’s six major religious groups, Sikhs have the most negative view of the role Partition played in Hindu-Muslim relations: Nearly two-thirds (66%) say it was a bad thing.

Most Indian Sikhs live in Punjab, along the border with Pakistan. The broader Northern region (especially Punjab) was strongly impacted by the partition of the subcontinent, and Northern Indians as a whole lean toward the position that Partition was a bad thing for Hindu-Muslim relations (48%) rather than a good thing (39%).

The South is the furthest region from the borders affected by Partition, and Southern Indians are about twice as likely to say that Partition was good as to say that it was bad for Hindu-Muslim relations (50% vs. 26%).

Attitudes toward Partition also vary considerably by region within specific religious groups. Among Muslims in the North and West, most say Partition was a bad thing for Hindu-Muslim relations (55% of Muslims in both regions). In the Eastern and Central parts of the country as well, Muslim public opinion leans toward the view that Partition was a bad thing for communal relations. By contrast, Muslims in the South and Northeast tend to see Partition as good for Hindu-Muslim relations.

Among Hindus, meanwhile, those in the North are closely divided on the issue, with 44% saying Partition was a good thing and 42% saying it was a bad thing. But in the West and South, Hindus tend to see Partition as a good thing for communal relations.

Poorer Hindus – that is, those who say they have been unable to afford basic necessities like food, housing and medical care in the last year – tend to say Partition was a good thing. But opinions are more divided among Hindus who have not recently experienced poverty (39% say it was a good thing, while 40% say it was a bad thing). Muslims who have not experienced recent financial hardship, however, are especially likely to see Partition as a bad thing: Roughly half (51%) say Partition was a bad thing for Hindu-Muslim relations, while only about a quarter (24%) see it as a good thing.

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Religious Discrimination in the Workplace: A Review and Examination of Current and Future Trends

2013, Journal of Business and Psychology

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Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal

Kathy Lund Dean , E. Scott Lee

Gwen Alexis

Gwendolyn Yvonne Alexis

SSRN Electronic Journal

Our nation has a unique, long-cherished commitment to religious freedom. Indeed, the first wave of immigrants came seeking refuge from religious persecution in Europe. The free exercise of religion, regardless of one’s religious beliefs, is a fundamental right guaranteed to all Americans and embodied in the First Amendment to our Constitution. As a result, America has become a diverse nation enriched by its multiple religious communities that practice their faiths freely and peacefully. America’s unique cultural tolerance for religious diversity is due in large part to the enforcement of constitutional rights and statutory laws that protect individuals and congregations from discrimination in public accommodations, education, and employment. While most people in America voluntarily comply with anti-discrimination laws based on a personal commitment to equality and justice for all, religious bigotry exists in American society. One need only review the increasing number of lawsuits filed by the EEOC over the past ten years. In 1997, religious discrimination lawsuits made up only 2.1% of the EEOC’s docket. By 2010, the rate of discrimination lawsuits increased significantly to 3.8%. Similarly, religious discrimination charges filed with the EEOC increased dramatically by 35% from 2001 to 2008. A disproportionate number of religious discrimination charges were filed by employees who wear headscarves, turbans, or beards for religious reasons because these practices carry a stigma that falsely stereotype them as terrorist, disloyal, or suspect. In the years immediately following the tragic September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, there was an upsurge in hatred, violence, and discrimination against Muslims, Arabs and South Asians. Despite the passage of more than ten years, pervasive discrimination persists due to a variety of factors that directly impact the workplace. For example, media images stereotyping, darkskinned, bearded males with Arabic-sounding names as representing the primary threat to the national security of the United States contribute to racial, national origin, and religious harassment in the workplace. Government selective counter-terrorism practices and policies have institutionalized a policy of discrimination against persons perceived to be Muslim, Arab, Middle Eastern, or South Asian on the basis of their name, race, religion, ethnicity, and national origin. The government’s disparate treatment of these communities, based on the pretext of national security, legitimizes workplace harassment. The result is a conflation of the racial Arab or South Asian with the religious category of Muslim coupled with the misperception that Islam is a radical and violent religion. Therefore, efforts aimed at combatting post-9/11 religious discrimination must adopt a holistic approach that rectifies the “bias legitimizing” actions of other government agencies. Accordingly, my recommendations are as follow: 1. Adopt creative legal theories of liability and use case briefs to educate judges about post-9/11 religious discrimination; 2. Train federal agencies about the adverse workplace consequences of selective law enforcement and immigration enforcement; 3. Train private sector employers about the rise in religious discrimination and how to proactively prevent it; 4. Normalize images of religious minorities in government publications; and 5. Diversify points of contact in outreach to religious communities about their legal rights and remedies.

Journal of Management, Spirituality & Religion

Kathy Lund Dean

American Business Law Journal

Jamie Prenkert , Julie Magid

Samantha Fairclough , Sam Cousley , Dave Nichols

Bahaudin Mujtaba

Texas State PA Applied Research Projects

Abstract Purpose: The purpose of this Applied Research Project is three-fold: first, this research develops a practical ideal model employee handbook by adapting one developed by Rebecca Short (1997) and Neftali Garcia (2002) and expanded upon by Shanna Brown (2013). Second, the model is used to assess 16 city employee handbooks in the Commonwealth of Virginia. Finally, based on this assessment, recommendations to improve the quality of the handbooks are made. Method: This research uses content analysis as the sole data collection method. Content analysis studies in this research are the city employee handbooks. A systematic random sampling was taken of handbooks in four city classifications (small, medium, large, extra-large) in the Commonwealth of Virginia. Each handbook was evaluated against the ideal handbook model and a rating assigned to each component. Findings: Overall, city employee handbooks in the Commonwealth of Virginia need improvement. It is recommended that the handbooks be updated to include legislation such as the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009 and the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010, as well as equal pay and anti-discrimination legislation. The handbooks also need to include updated maternal/paternal leave policies and social media use guidelines, define bullying, and provide information about union membership prohibition for public employees.

Fifty years after Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, unlawful discrimination continues to ail American workplaces. Despite the prevailing narrative that America is now "post-racial" after the election of the first African American president, equal opportunity still eludes many Americans. Their membership in racial, ethnic, or religious groups stigmatized as the "other" adversely affects their access to education, political empowerment, and equal opportunity in the workplace. At the time Title VII was passed, victims often experienced explicit bias against their protected group. The law’s immediate effect was to ban overt prejudice causing disparate intergroup discrimination between men and women, blacks and whites, different ethnicities, and Christians and non-Christians.As a result, Title VII, along with other anti-discrimination laws, has been relatively successful in rooting out explicit bias in employment. Many employers now refrain from overtly treating employees disparately on account of an immutable characteristic. But, as the data show, the absence of discriminatory policies on paper does not always translate into a discrimination free workplace in practice. Rather, it pushes bias into more covert manifestations wherein facially neutral factors become proxies for unlawful discrimination. While Title VII prohibits covert bias; it is ill equipped to prevent two increasingly prevalent forms of discrimination: 1) implicit bias arising from negative stereotypes of protected classes; and 2) disparate treatment of subgroups of protected classes who do not conform to coercive assimilationist pressures.Because an employee alleging discrimination must show that a similarly situated worker outside the protected class does not receive the same adverse treatment or impact, an employer who treats a subgroup of a minority better than another subgroup of the same minority can evade liability. Of course, if the difference in treatment among the subgroups is based on performance and skills directly related to the work at issue, then no liability should attach. However, that is not always the case. Disparate treatment of members of the same protected class arises from negative racial, ethnic, or religious stereotypes that privileges those able and willing to perform their identity in accordance with assimilationist demands of the majority group. The effect is intragroup discrimination based on intergroup bias rooted in implicit negative stereotyping. Female employees who fall under multiple protected classes face an intersection of identity performance pressures as women, racial or ethnic minorities, and religious minorities.The dominant group’s expectations of how women or members of minority groups should behave, dress, and communicate to be "professional" are often contradictory due to conflicting stereotypes. A Black woman, for example, who is assertive, ambitious, and exhibits leadership qualities associated as masculine characteristics, risks being stigmatized as aggressive, insubordinate, and threatening because of negative stereotypes of blacks. Meanwhile, her behavior contradicts gender conformity norms that women should be deferential, gentle, soft spoken, and pleasant. And if she is a Muslim, then her behavior triggers stereotypes of Muslims as terrorists, disloyal, foreign, and suspect. For workplace anti-discrimination laws to eradicate these multiple binds that disparately impact women of color, this Article argues that Title VII jurisprudence should take into account intergroup discrimination based on intragroup identity performance to assure all employees, not just a subset of a protected class, are covered by workplace antidiscrimination law. As such, a plaintiff’s treatment should not be compared only with similarly situated employees outside the protected class but also with similarly situated employees within the protected class whose identity performance accommodates coercive assimilationism rooted in stereotypes. This Article applies social psychology and antidiscrimination theories to the case of Muslim women of color in the workplace, an under-researched area in legal scholarship. I examine in detail the identity performance challenges and contradictions faced by Muslim women of color as "intersectionals" facing stereotypes against 1) Muslims as terrorists, violent, and disloyal; 2) Muslim women as meek, oppressed, and lacking individual agency; 3) women as sexualized, terminally second best to men, and uncommitted to their careers; 4) immigrants as forever foreign and undeserving of equal treatment; and 5) ethnic minorities from the Middle East and South Asia as barbaric, misogynist, and anti-American. I conclude that Muslim women of color are at risk of falling between the cracks of Title VII jurisprudence due to courts’ unwillingness to recognize the harms caused by coercive assimilationst pressures to conform one’s identity to comport to high status group norms, irrespective of the relevance to work performance.

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