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When you ran the numbers, some of the negative anticipated effects of having parents with different religions didn't seem to be present. Do you have an opinion as to why?

This finding was especially surprising to us, because we figured that internalized well-being (such as self-esteem) would be more affected by religious heterogamy because youth would be less sure about beliefs and [would likely have] a weaker sense of identity.

I suspect that part of the reason that we did not find negative effects [in those areas] is that being raised in a religiously heterogamous family may actually be beneficial to youth in some ways. If interfaith parents teach their children that it is important to find a religion that best suits them [as individuals] and accept religious differences in others, then youth may actually develop a strong sense of identity and have an opportunity to find out which religious beliefs are important to them.

In addition, being raised in a diverse family is likely to increase one's tolerance and acceptance of others. These benefits likely have a greater effect on outcomes like self-esteem, life satisfaction, and school performance than delinquency, which may explain the results of our study.

Negative effects that are present include a substantially higher rate of underage drinking and marijuana use. What do you think accounts for those results? One thing that seems confusing is that one might expect a population with much higher rates of those behaviors to manifest problems like lower grades.

Results from our study suggest that higher rates of substance use are due to lower religious participation in these families. Thus, youth raised in religiously heterogamous marriages may be less exposed to the social control that religion provides, increasing the likelihood that they become involved with drugs and alcohol. Most religions encourage youth to lead good and meaningful lives, which includes living a healthy lifestyle free from these types of substances. Youth who are highly involved in religious communities may be more likely to adhere to these teachings and have fewer opportunities to engage in substance use. Without this social support network, youth in religiously heterogamous families may be more likely to experiment with drugs and alcohol. Although educational performance may also be part of living a "good and meaningful life," the pressure from religious institutions to get good grades may be less than the pressure to avoid behavior like drug use.

Instead, factors like parents' education level and age (which are unrelated to these kinds of delinquency) may be more closely linked to youths' grades. Interfaith parents have a higher average level of education than same-faith parents, so grades may be highly emphasized in religiously heterogamous families, reducing differences between children raised by same-faith and interfaith parents.

Two weeks ago, I discussed an op-ed by Yale's Anthony Kronman in which he called for taking the humanities more seriously in undergraduate curriculum. In making his case for America's universities to give strong consideration to courses that ask ultimate questions about life, Kronman urged his readers not to concede the field to "religious fundamentalists" who are paying a great deal of attention to classical learning on the relevant subjects.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Kronman's essay brought responses from Christians who disagreed with his characterization of the situation as "dangerous." John Seel of Walden Media was particularly eloquent when he wrote:

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October (Web-only) 2007, Vol. 51