Relations between attitudes of religious fundamentalism and New Age beliefs

The first aim of this study is to examine the relationships between Religious Fundamentalism (RF) and New Age (NA) Beliefs; at the same time between the same variables and the demografical variables such as age, sex, marital status, socio-economic status (SES) and residence.The sample of the study consist of students who study at several faculties of different universities such as Dokuz Eylül University, Karadeniz Technical University, Cumhuriyet University and Anadolu University (m=63, f=115 total: 178). The range of age is 18 to 30 (Mage=21.32).Religious Fundamentalism Scale used for gathering data was constructed and developed by Altemeyer and Hunsberger (1992). The other instrument (New Age Beliefs Questionnaire) was developed by the researcher.The results showed that RF is correlated with the variable of education at p<.05 significant level (r=.156), and the variable of age at p<.01 significant level (r=.182); but it is not correlated with the other variables such as marital status, socio-economic status (SES), residence, sex and New Age Beliefs. As a result of the one-way variant analysis which is carried out in order to determine the difference between the average points of Religious Fundamentalism Scale according to the fields of education. The results showed that there is a significant difference between the average points of Theology students and Art, Music and Physical Education ones (F(6.171)=4.710, p<.001).As for the variable of New Age Beliefs, it has been found that it is significantly correlated with age variable at p<.001 significant level (r=.248). But the difference between the groups is not significant. Besides, any correlation between the New Age Beliefs and all other demographic variables, such as civil status, socio-economical status, sex and field of education, has not been found.Key Words: Religious Fundamentalism, New Religious Movements, New Age,Reencarnation, Astrology, Karma.