Social Reproduction of Religiosity in the Immigrant Context: The Role of Family Transmission and Family Formation — Evidence from France

This paper compares two aspects of the social reproduction of religion: parent†to†child transmission, and religious homogamy. Analysis of a survey of immigrants in France shows that for parent†to†child transmission, immigrant status/generation is not the central variable — rather, variation is across religions with Muslim families showing high continuity. Immigrant status/generation does directly matter for partner choice. In Christian and Muslim families alike, religious in†partnering significantly declines in the second generation. In turn, the offspring of religiously non†homogamous families is less religious. For Muslim immigrants this points to the possibility of a non†trivial decline in religiosity in the third generation.