“Is that a Mom and Dad Church?” Children’s Constructions of Meaning through Focus Group Interviews

Abstract

Children are not clay tablets upon which adults can etch predetermined futures. Rather, children are active agents who repeatedly interact with various social fields. Religion, one of those fields, is a major social institution that influences one’s religious beliefs as well as one’s secular behavior. Studying children’s views on religion and how they relate to their religious communities makes explicit the ways children actively participate in their own religious socialization. Consequently, this study is an examination of children’s participation in their religious communities at two evangelical Protestant churches in Northern California utilizing focus group interviews of children as a way to get at children’s collaborative constructions of meanings. Consistent with current understandings in the sociology of childhood, findings indicate that children separate themselves from those of adults within their own “kid congregations” that are distinctly separate from the adults. Moreover, this research addresses a gap in the sociological literature regarding how children talk about their relationships to their church communities; it has implications for how one interprets and approaches current and future studies investigating how children relate to their religious communities.

Citation

Zonio, H. (2017), "“Is that a Mom and Dad Church?” Children’s Constructions of Meaning through Focus Group Interviews", Researching Children and Youth: Methodological Issues, Strategies, and Innovations (Sociological Studies of Children and Youth, Vol. 22), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 251-276. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1537-466120180000022012