Why are women more religious than men? A research among Muslim Iranians

The sociological and psychological texts of religion and the descriptive data from numerous surveys and researches in different societies, including Iran, all indicate that in a wide range of measures, women are more religious than men. Nevertheless, explaining why is still a scientific puzzle. In the present research paper, we first try at the theoretical level with an analytical review of the theoretical explanations related to the religious gender gap in the sociological literature, to extract and formulate the main arguments of the theories of structural location, deprivation, socialization, and risk preferences/risk aversion in the form of research hypotheses. Then, at the empirical level, for confront these hypotheses with the data obtained from the national population of Iranian Muslims, the degree of conformity and correspondence of these theoretical predictions with the data and empirical evidence was evaluated and judged. The results of the research provided empirical support for theories of deprivation, socialization, and risk preferences/risk aversion; while structural location theory could not be empirically supported.