ABSTRACT
Both sociology and psychology are interested in understanding and explaining humans. But they go about these tasks quite differently. Psychologists generally focus upon phenomena and processes that exist or occur beneath the skin: the mind, personality, brain functioning, cognitive processes, neurological activity, chemical reactions. In contrast, sociologists generally focus upon phenomena and processes that occur and exist outside the skin: social patterns, cultural norms, institutional forces, media influence, and so on. This difference of focus plays itself out quite prominently in the psychological versus sociological study of religion. As Malcolm Hamilton (1995, 21) puts it, “Psychological theories hold that religion is an affair of the individual and springs from sources within the individual, whereas sociological theories hold that religion is an affair of the group or society and that individual religiosity stems from social sources.”
