There's been a lot of interesting research published lately about "stereotype threat": the idea that people who are aware of being stereotyped in a certain negative way tend to perform worse in accordance with the stereotype.
One noteworthy example is the stereotype that women are no good at math. Researchers have found that women who have to identify their gender on a math test before they take it score more poorly than women who don't. Just the reminder that they are women (and thus, according to the stereotype, are worse at math) causes performance to drop.
But this doesn't just affect traditionally disadvantaged or minority groups. A new study looked at the stereotype that Christians are opposed to science, and found similar results.
'She [Kimberly Rios] then ran an experiment with Christians and non-Christians volunteers who were asked to solve problems of logic. Christian volunteers reminded about the stereotype that Christianity and science don't mix did worse than Christian volunteers who weren't reminded of the stereotype. This, of course, is classic stereotype threat.
She also found that when she gave volunteers a test, Christians did worse when she labeled the test as a test of scientific ability, rather than a test of intuitive ability, even though the test was exactly the same, presumably because labeling it as a test of scientific ability triggers stereotype threat just like the girls asked to list their sex before taking a math test.'
(The abstract for the study is here: http://spp.sagepub.com/content/6/8/959)
There's nothing that bars a Christian from being a good scientist per se. Many great scientists of the past have been Christian. But the rise of Christian fundamentalism and Biblical inerrancy, with the resulting the very public rejection of scientific principles such as evolution, the Big Bang, climate change, etc. by vocal folk on the Christian Right, and the identification of True Christianity as meaning holding those fundamentalist views, has led to the stereotype that Christians reject science, or at least have to be disinterested in it in order to be "good Christians."
It's bullshit, of course, but it's become a strong enough stereotype to actually cause a negative testing performance from at least some Christians when it's brought up.
(This also raises a question in my mind about surveys related to religion and science, and to what extent the appallingly high numbers of Christians who are skeptical about, for example, evolution, comes from this same phenomenon: "Because I've been reminded about religion, I'm reminded I'm supposed to answer thusly to such questions.")
In short, negative stereotypes aren't just harmful to oppressed groups. They have the potential to harm anyone.
This is pretty neat. It's right up there with kids who are taught a lot of religion young, also being more scared of fictional monsters. I guess I was pretty lucky. I went to parochial school K-12. In HS, during a class that studied the bible, the nun teaching the class was quite forward: This book is not a science book. It is not a math book. It is to teach you about your faith and how to live your life. If you want to learn about science, go take a science class down the hall. If you want to learn about history, go to history class. If you want to learn about math, go to math class. This class is to help you use this book and apply its teachings to your life. The Earth is not flat. A man did not live to be 900+ years old. A boat did not house 2 of every animal on the planet." Pretty progressive.