3. In an interesting study of a controversial topic, Sethi and Seligman studied the effect of religious fundamentalism on optimism (1993). Think about this problem: are religious fundamentalists likely to be less optimistic or more so than those with a more “liberal”

religious orientation? Perhaps fundamentalists have a strict and stern religious orientation that will lead to greater pessimism (and thus less optimism). Or perhaps those with more fundamentalist views decide to let God worry about the problems of the world, thus leading to a more optimistic view. What do you think?

The files titled “Sethi & Seligman simulated” (there are SPSS, Excel, and text [.dat]

files) are designed to simulate the Sethi & Seligman data from a MR perspective.3