Religiosity and secularization in a country using World Valu…

vidence Evaluation Artifact Paper – Similar to the data in the Kasselstrand et al. book, each student is going to pick one country for which there are data in the World Values Survey (WVS – ) in at least two waves. Your assignment in this paper is to examine three of the religiosity questions in the WVS over time (at least two waves, more are fine). The WVS includes questions about religious affiliation, belief in a god, importance of religion, and other religious beliefs. This assignment doesnt actually require statistical analysis skills beyond being able to understand percentages, read tables and charts, and create a table or chart. Your paper should be written for an intended audience of people with a level of education similar to your own but with no knowledge of the content of this class. What you will turn in: An essay with an introduction, a body, and a conclusion. The essay must be at least 1,500 words. The essay must include at least 5 peer-reviewed articles published in the last 20 years that are related to the topic of your paper (e.g., the country of interest or the variable of interest); the articles must be properly formatted using either ASA style. (NOTE: Articles published in the journal Religions are not acceptable. It is a predatory journal. You are strongly encouraged to focus on articles published in Sociology of Religion, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Social Compass, Secularism and Nonreligion, or Review of Religious Research. You can also use journals published by the American Sociological Association. If you arent sure about your articles, ask your instructor.) Your essay should also include a citation to the Kasselstrand et al. (2023) book. Your essay MUST also define secularization. Your paper should also include a chart (bar or line graph) or table showing the relevant statistics over time. Finally, and most importantly, you need to determine whether religiosity in your country of interest has decreased, increased, or stayed the same and explain your findings in light of the topics we have discussed in class. Basically, you need to answer whether what has happened in the country you are examining aligns with secularization theory or not. Regarding peer-reviewed articles… Before undertaking a research project, you should always see what prior research has already been undertaken on that topic. You will use one of the electronic databases (e.g., JSTOR, Academic Search Ultimate, SocIndex, etc.) to find peer-reviewed, scientific articles that relate to your topic of interest. The articles need to be recent (within the last 20 years) and relevant (if you cannot figure out how to discuss them in your paper, they are not relevant). Your Bibliography should be in ASA format, like this: Cragun, Ryan T., and Michael Nielsen. 2009. Fighting Over “Mormon”: Media Coverage of the FLDS and LDS. Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. Just to make this clear, including the articles in your essay does not mean that you summarize each article. If you submit as part of your paper 5 summaries of articles, youre going to get a very poor grade on this part. SYNTHESIZE the articles rather than providing a mere summary. Every one of the articles you read will include an example of a synthesis. In the paper, you should reference the articles you read when you draw upon them (called in-line citations). You MUST discuss every article you include in your bibliography at the end of the paper. However, no direct quotes are allowed! If you end up thinking an article you originally picked is irrelevant, then find a new one. A great way to find new articles is to look through the citations in other relevant articles or to do a cited reference search. A grading rubric for this assignment will be posted on Canvas. Submit your assignment on Canvas before the due date. This assignment addresses learning outcomes 1 and 4.