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Atheists: A Groundbreaking Study of America's Nonbelievers Paperback – June 1, 2006

by Bruce E. Hunsberger (Author), Bob Altemeyer (Author)

14 customer reviews

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According to polls, most Americans believe in God. But disbelief is spreading. After reviewing the mounting evidence that organized religion is declining in many countries, this accessible book provides the first scientific study of active atheists. The authors surveyed nearly 300 members of atheist organizations in the United States. Besides soliciting these nonbelievers’ level of education, political leanings, etc., the researchers sought to understand how each respondent had become an atheist. Had they ever believed in God, or had they never? Had they paid a price for their atheism?

Three chapters describe the levels of dogmatism, zealotry, and religious prejudice found among the active atheists. These results, compared with others obtained from more ordinary samples of atheists (and strong fundamentalists), often surprised the authors. Uniquely, the book features a chapter in which the atheists give their reaction to the study and its often-surprising findings. Another chapter breaks down the answers a large Canadian sample gave to the measures used in the American study, according to how religious the respondent was—from atheist to agnostic to four different levels of theistic intensity. A clear finding emerged: the more religious a group was, the more their personalities, prejudices, and beliefs separated them from everyone else.

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This slender, conversational, but methodologically sound treatise on the inner world of atheists will pleasantly surprise readers accustomed to the soporific "academese" of most sociological studies. Altemeyer and (the late) Hunsberger have conducted some of the first surveys of atheists, a decided minority within a very religious United States. The book is based primarily on surveys of "active" atheists (i.e., members of atheist clubs in the San Francisco Bay Area, Alabama and Idaho), as well as on a comparison group of Canadian parents (who happened to have children in the authors' psychology classes at the University of Manitoba). In previous studies, atheists have been lumped together with "the nonreligious" who might include unaffiliated or "non-church-attending" theists. Here, self-described atheists finally get their day, as perhaps they should since one of the growing religious categories in the General Social Survey of Americans is "None." The study is limited in scope, but the flaws are so forthrightly acknowledged and the writing is so fresh, honest, compelling and entertaining that it is bound to become an important launching point for more studies of what makes atheists tick. (June)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review

"Who are the atheists? What sustains them? The authors have opened the door to scientific research in this area in a meticulous and very engaging way. Once you start reading this book you won’t want to put it down! The reader is in for a surprise (an interesting one) and a treat at every turn of a page."
RAYMOND F. PALOUTZIAN
Professor of Psychology, Westmont College, Santa Barbara, CA
Editor, The International Journal for the Psychology of Religion

"This slender, conversational, but methodologically sound treatise on the inner world of atheists will pleasantly surprise readers accustomed to the soporific ‘academese’ of most sociological studies…The study is limited in scope, but the flaws are so forthrightly acknowledged and the writing is so fresh, honest, compelling and entertaining, that it is bound to become an important launching point for more studies of what makes atheists tick."

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

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Product details

Paperback: 159 pages
Publisher: Prometheus Books; First Edition edition (June 1, 2006)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 9781591024132
ISBN-13: 978-1591024132
ASIN: 1591024137
Product Dimensions: 6.1 x 0.4 x 9 inches
Shipping Weight: 0.8 ounces
Average Customer Review: 14 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,356,163 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #1282 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Religious Studies > Psychology
- #1290 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Atheism
- #3380 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Social Sciences > Research

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J. Marlin

This study deserves a serious followup

August 21, 2012

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

For all of the social science research that's been done on religious belief, far too little has been done on religious unbelief. This work stands as a useful corrective. The study is not without its (self-acknowledged) limitation, but it strikes me as being pioneering work in a very important field. After all, across Europe, even nominal religious belief has sunk to historic lows (in my last trip there I was struck by the number of parish churches and even large urban cathedrals that had been converted to pubs, discos, boutiques, and condominiums). The U.S., too, at least outside the "Bible Belt," is very slowly drifting from belief to dead orthodoxy to nominal faith to (at least) agnosticism. More sociologists need to be exploring and explaining this phenomenon.

So I'm glad a commenter on another review I wrote pointed me to this book. It seems to be the first sociological attempt to find out why people become atheists and what they actually think -- and answers to both questions were interesting, surprising, and contrary to what some theorists might predict.

While I think this study has some flaws -- which the surviving writer, Bob Altemeyer, incorporates into his writing (Bruce Hunsberger, sadly, passed while the work was in progress) -- I think it deserves a near-top rating for the following reasons:
*The writers do a remarkable job of presenting their material to a general, educated, adult audience. It is so easy for academic researchers to slip into the jargon and familiar constructions of their discipline, but somehow these writers stepped back from the dense language and conceptual smoke that so many academics use as badges of authority.
*The study seems well constructed, and conducted with the utmost of integrity.
*The clear and unambiguous spirit of the work is to figure out "what really is out there?" rather than to reach preconceived conclusions.

As I wrote above, this appears to be pioneering work, and some others now need to follow on. The authors acknowledge the geographic and numerical limitations of their results, meaning that more and larger scale work is due. Given the West's major shifts in religious belief in this age, I hope that work is underway now.

(So why not five stars? Well, I reserve five for books that knock my socks off. This one didn't, but I'm still glad I read it and learned much from it.)

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Sophia

An eye- and mind-opening book

November 1, 2012

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Anyone who has been told there is something unAmerican or amoral about atheists should check this out. The plain facts are that nonbelievers rank the lowest in bigotry, narrow-mindedness, prejudice and general good citizenship than any other group. The worst in those categories are the high-end fundamentalists. The authors encourage other psychologists to replicate their study to confirm the conclusions. Yes, they certainly should. Time to get rid of baseless stereotypes.

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OldGrayDog

This book should be of interest to anyone involved in ...

July 5, 2014

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

This book should be of interest to anyone involved in the study of the psychology of religion. It offers the results of the authors' survey and interview studies of the attitudes of confirmed atheists as well as their profiles on several personality measures, particularly dogmatism as compared to similar study of attitudes and personality profiles of religious fundamentalists. The methodology involves acceptable social science procedures. The samples are limited to the San Francisco Bay area, a few subjects drawn from some western and Midwestern U.S. states and one providence in Canada. Thus the total subject pool is on the small end of the size spectrum and possibly not entirely representative of the total non-believer population. Even so the authors found some interesting distinctions not just between non-believers and believers, but among believers themselves. While "Groundbreaking" may be a bit grandiose a description, this is the first attempt to use accepted social scientific methods to study atheists and is welcomed for that. Another reviewer commented on the literary style, finding it distracting. So did I. The authors' attempts to be witty and casual resulted in prose which often diminishes the impact of the information they present.

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Grammy

Atheists are good folk

November 23, 2016

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Very interesting book - many people are afraid of atheists - this is the first study.

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A. BAZ

Amazon is an amaizing co.

July 31, 2013

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

I'm an atheists by my self....so, I find the book very informative, little may be to "numbering?" but in general very good.-
A. Baz

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November 18, 2008

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

The low score given to this book needs explanation. The book bored me to tears. However, i am not blaming the authors: I doubt I could have done any better at writing a book about poll results.

The most interesting discussion involved the stories of ostracization told by some the Atheists in the poll. When they lost their faith, they did not desert their families and friends - their families and friends deserted them.

The rest of the results paint a picture of the typical Atheist, who except for disbelief in religion, is not all that different from anyone else.

7 people found this helpful

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John Aha

Atheists, a subgroup of the "nones"

November 4, 2006

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

This book should be of interest to people of all beliefs. The authors of this book have conducted a very detailed study into the viewpoints of American and Canadian Atheists, and compared them to Christian groups. The result are presented in a very detailed scientific manner yet in a easily understood way for the lay reader.

The book is very easy to read and some the results are very surprising.
It's not only a must read for Atheists, but also for people of all faiths.

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Atheists: A Groundbreaking Study of America's Nonbelievers Paperback – June 1, 2006

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