Recent studies claim that having an analytical cognitive style is correlated with reduced religiosity in western populations. However, in cultural contexts where social norms constrain behavior, such cognitive characteristics may have reduced influence on behaviors and beliefs. We labeled this the ‘constraining environments hypothesis.’ In a sample of 246 Muslims in Turkey, the hypothesis was supported for gender. Females face social pressure to be religious. Unlike their male counterparts, they were more religious, less analytical, and their analytical scores were uncorrelated with religiosity. We had predicted an analogous effect for the comparison between monolingual and bilingual students, since English-proficient students are exposed to a wider social environment. The bilingual students were less religious than the monolingual students, yet they were also less analytical. Thus, being analytical was not the path to lower religiosity for the bilingual students. Cognitive styles need to be studied along with social norms in a variety of cultures, to understand religion-cognition relationships.

最近的研究声称，具有分析性的认知风格与西方人群的宗教活动减少有关。但是，在社会规范约束行为的文化背景下，这种认知特征可能会减少对行为和信念的影响。我们称其为“约束环境假设”。在土耳其的246名穆斯林样本中，该假设支持性别平等。女性面临着信奉宗教的社会压力。与男性不同，他们更加虔诚，较少分析，而且他们的分析成绩与宗教信仰无关。我们已经预料到单语和双语学生之间的比较会产生类似的效果，因为精通英语的学生会面临更广泛的社会环境。双语学生比单一语言的学生宗教信仰少，但是他们也缺乏分析能力。因此，进行分析并不是双语学生降低宗教信仰的途径。需要与多种文化中的社会规范一起研究认知风格，以了解宗教与认知之间的关系。