Gender role ideology, spirituality, and religiousness in military contexts

Different authors observe that the conceptions in relation to gender in military contexts are reinforced by the links between the Armed Forces and religious institutions, traditionally characterized by the promotion of more conservative gender roles. However, while higher attachment to traditional values seems to be associated with religion, it´s relationship with spirituality remains unexplored. For this reason, this study aimed to explore the relationships between spirituality, religiosity and gender role ideology in a sample of 102 participants of both genders with military experience. The ASPIRES and IRG scales were used for the evaluation of the constructs of interest. The results show that while religiosity is found to be positively related to beliefs linked to a traditional gender role ideology, spirituality is not related to it at all. The findings of the study contribute to the clarification of the way in which these variables are related to each other in religious and military contexts, as well as to the discrimination of spirituality and religiosity as different constructs.