God's will
Good for god? Religious motivation reduces perceived responsibility for and morality of good deeds
Will Gervais
Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, forthcoming
Abstract:
Many people view religion as a crucial source of morality. However, 6 experiments (total N = 1,078) revealed that good deeds are perceived as less moral if they are performed for religious reasons. Religiously motivated acts were seen as less moral than the exact same acts performed for other reasons (Experiments 1–2 and 6). Religious motivations also reduced attributions of intention and responsibility (Experiments 3–6), an effect that fully mediated the effect of religious motivations on perceived morality (Experiment 6). The effects were not explained by different perceptions of motivation orientation (i.e., intrinsic vs. extrinsic) across conditions (Experiment 4) and also were evident when religious upbringing led to an intuitive moral response (Experiment 5). Effects generalized across religious and nonreligious participants. When viewing a religiously motivated good deed, people infer that actually helping others is, in part, a side effect of other motivations rather than an end in itself. Thus, religiously motivated actors are seen as less responsible than secular actors for their good deeds, and their helping behavior is viewed as less moral than identical good deeds performed for either unclear or secular motivations.
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Steven Pirutinsky
Criminal Justice and Behavior, forthcoming
Abstract:
Previous research suggests that religiousness correlates with less criminal behavior and that this relationship is partially mediated by higher self-control. Because most studies are cross-sectional, causality remains uncertain as stable between-subject factors may influence self-control, religiousness, and offending, confounding their relationships. Moreover, directionality may be reversed with higher self-control leading to both higher religiousness and less offending. The current research aimed to directly exclude these possibilities using longitudinal data from 1,354 adolescents participating in the Pathways to Desistance Study. Results indicated that short-term, within-subject increased religiousness predicted decreased future criminal behavior and that this effect was partially mediated by increased self-control. A reversed model in which past self-control predicted future religiousness was not significant. These findings suggest that religiousness may be causally related to offending, and self-control is likely one of multiple mediating processes. Additional research in this area appears warranted and may yield effective strategies for reducing criminal behavior and improving self-control.
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Kristin Laurin & Jason Plaks
Social Psychological and Personality Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
We hypothesize that two distinct facets of religiosity — orthodoxy (an emphasis on belief) and orthopraxy (an emphasis on behavior) — predict differential sensitivity to an actor’s intent when making moral judgments. Participants judged actors who performed misdeeds intentionally or unintentionally. In Study 1, high orthopraxy predicted harsher judgments of the unintentional actor, while high orthodoxy predicted more lenient judgments. In Study 2, we investigated a potential explanation for these effects, priming participants with either an “action focus” or a “thought focus.” Action-focused participants judged the unintentional actor more harshly than did thought-focused participants. In Study 3, participants from an orthopraxic tradition (Hinduism) judged the unintentional actor more harshly than did those from an orthodox tradition (Protestantism). These findings contribute to a growing literature on the multifaceted nature of religion. They also carry broader implications for understanding people’s responses to actions as a function of the actor’s mental state.
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Jennifer Glass & Philip Levchak
American Journal of Sociology, January 2014, Pages 1002-1046
Abstract:
Why do states with larger proportions of religious conservatives have higher divorce rates than states with lower proportions of religious conservatives? This project examines whether earlier transitions to marriage and parenthood among conservative Protestants (known risk factors for divorce) contribute to this paradox while attending to other plausible explanations. County-level demographic information from all 50 states is combined from a variety of public data sources and merged with individual records from the National Surveys of Family Growth to estimate both aggregated county and multilevel individual models of divorce. Results show that individual religious conservatism is positively related to individual divorce risk, solely through the earlier transitions to adulthood and lower incomes of conservative Protestants. However, the proportion of conservative Protestants in a county is also independently and positively associated with both the divorce rate in that county and an individual’s likelihood of divorcing. The earlier family formation and lower levels of educational attainment and income in counties with a higher proportion of conservative Protestants can explain a substantial portion of this association. Little support is found for alternative explanations of the association between religious conservatism and divorce rates, including the relative popularity of marriage versus cohabitation across counties.
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Sky Ammann
American Politics Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
Does the act of attending religious services “cause” individuals to participate in politics? There is no known literature that examines this question using longitudinal, individual-level data. Therefore, using the Youth Parent Socialization Panel Study, this analysis examines three theoretical possibilities: the indirect, direct, and null relationships. The results show that changes in religious attendance are primarily indirectly linked to political participation through civic activity, a factor highly correlated with political participation. There is also some limited evidence for a direct effect. As individuals increase their political participation over time, they are slightly more likely to participate in political activities and vote. But, the findings also imply that the previous literature has likely overstated the role of religious attendance in generating political participation. Once individuals start participating politically, they continue to do so regardless of changes in their attendance at places of worship.
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The effect of religious imagery in a risk-taking paradigm
Jessica Shenberger, Brandt Smith & Michael Zárate
Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology, May 2014, Pages 150-158
Abstract:
The drug cartel violence occurring at the U.S.–Mexico border requires an investigation of the social and cultural factors that influence risky behaviors. The current study tested to what extent religious imagery leads individuals to follow suggestions for increased risk-taking behaviors. We used culturally relevant religious imagery primes and nonreligious imagery primes and measured the extent to which individuals followed a confederate’s suggestions to engage in risky behaviors on a lab-based risk task. As predicted, the effect of confederate suggestions led to greater risk taking in the religious imagery condition than in the nonreligious imagery condition. The findings have important implications for current narco-terrorism and in other contexts where terrorists use religious imagery to influence the behaviors of their group members. The current study demonstrates that when individuals are exposed to religious concepts, they are more susceptible to the influence of others to engage in risky behaviors.
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Everything Is Permitted? People Intuitively Judge Immorality as Representative of Atheists
Will Gervais
PLoS ONE, April 2014
Abstract:
Scientific research yields inconsistent and contradictory evidence relating religion to moral judgments and outcomes, yet most people on earth nonetheless view belief in God (or gods) as central to morality, and many view atheists with suspicion and scorn. To evaluate intuitions regarding a causal link between religion and morality, this paper tested intuitive moral judgments of atheists and other groups. Across five experiments (N = 1,152), American participants intuitively judged a wide variety of immoral acts (e.g., serial murder, consensual incest, necrobestiality, cannibalism) as representative of atheists, but not of eleven other religious, ethnic, and cultural groups. Even atheist participants judged immoral acts as more representative of atheists than of other groups. These findings demonstrate a prevalent intuition that belief in God serves a necessary function in inhibiting immoral conduct, and may help explain persistent negative perceptions of atheists.
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Andrew Franks & Kyle Scherr
Journal of Applied Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Prejudice against atheists is pervasive in the United States. Atheists lag behind virtually all other minority groups on measures of social acceptance. The sociofunctional approach suggests that distrust is at the core of anti-atheist prejudice, thus making it qualitatively different than prejudice against other disadvantaged groups. Accordingly, this research examined political bias against atheists, gays, and Blacks and the affective content accompanying such biases. Results indicated that atheists suffered the largest deficit in voting intentions from Christian participants, and this deficit was accompanied by distrust, disgust, and fear, thereby suggesting that the affective content of anti-atheist prejudice is both broader and more extreme than prejudice against other historically disadvantaged groups. Theoretical and applied implications are discussed.
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Is There an Islamist Political Advantage?
Melani Cammett & Pauline Jones Luong
Annual Review of Political Science, 2014, Pages 187-206
Abstract:
There is a widespread presumption that Islamists have an advantage over their opponents when it comes to generating mass appeal and winning elections. The question remains, however, as to whether these advantages — or, what we refer to collectively as an Islamist political advantage — actually exist. We argue that — to the extent that Islamists have a political advantage — the primary source of this advantage is reputation rather than the provision of social services, organizational capacity, or ideological hegemony. Our purpose is not to dismiss the main sources of the Islamist political advantage identified in scholarly literature and media accounts, but to suggest a different causal path whereby each of these factors individually and sometimes jointly promotes a reputation for Islamists as competent, trustworthy, and pure. It is this reputation for good governance that enables Islamists to distinguish themselves in the streets and at the ballot box.
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Voting Islamist or voting secular? An empirical analysis of voting outcomes in Egypt’s “Arab Spring”
May Elsayyad & Shima’a Hanafy
Public Choice, July 2014, Pages 109-130
Abstract:
This paper studies empirically the voting outcomes of Egypt’s first parliamentary elections after the Arab Spring. In light of the strong Islamist success at the polls, we explore the main determinants of Islamist versus secular voting. We identify two dimensions that affect voting outcomes at the constituency level: socioeconomic profile and the electoral institutional framework. Our results show that education is negatively associated with Islamist voting. Interestingly, we find significant evidence suggesting that higher poverty levels are associated with a lower vote share for Islamist parties. Exploiting the sequential voting setup, we show that later voting stages have not resulted in stronger support for the already winning Islamist parties (i.e., there is no bandwagon effect).
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Sky Ammann
Social Science Quarterly, forthcoming
Objective: No studies in the American context consider the influence of parental religious socialization on the development of individuals’ party identifications (PIDs). This study attempts to fill the gap. The theory posits that parental religious socialization plays an important developmental role in shaping a child's PID. However, the precise relationship between a parent's religion and the child's PID may vary over time and across generations in response to changing religio-partisan conflicts.
Methods: The expectations are tested using child-parent pairs from the Youth–Parent Socialization Panel Study. Conventional bivariate and multivariate techniques are employed to estimate a child's seven-point PID. Measures of parental religious belonging, beliefs, and behaviors, as well as a parent's PID, other parental sociodemographic controls, and measures of a child's religion are included in the multivariate models.
Results: In the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, a pre-Boomer parent's religious belonging and to a very limited extent religious behavior are more influential for the Baby Boomer child's PID than religious beliefs. However, for the younger generation included in the study, in the 1990s, a Baby Boomer parent's religious beliefs become more influential to his or her post-Boomer child's PID than does the parent's religious belonging or behavior.
Conclusions: The findings imply an important and evolving role of parental religious socialization in shaping individuals’ PIDs.
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A Relationship With God? Connecting with the Divine to Assuage Fears of Interpersonal Rejection
Kristin Laurin, Karina Schumann & John Holmes
Social Psychological and Personality Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
We examine the possibility that people can leverage their “relationship” with God as a stand-in for interpersonal relationships. More specifically, we hypothesize that people will seek closeness with the divine when facing the threat of interpersonal rejection and that conversely, they will seek interpersonal closeness when facing the threat of divine rejection. We test this idea across four studies. Along the way, we test additional predictions derived from the close relationships literature, concerning the consequences of this process and the moderating role of self-esteem. Taken together, our findings add to the literature on God as a relationship partner and connect this idea to the dynamic ebb and flow of interpersonal connection.
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A Religion of Wellbeing? The Appeal of Buddhism to Men in London, United Kingdom
Tim Lomas et al.
Psychology of Religion and Spirituality, forthcoming
Abstract:
Against a backdrop of increasing secularization, the number of Buddhists in Britain continues to rise (Office for National Statistics, 2012). However, few studies have explored the reasons people are drawn toward Buddhism, with none focusing on men specifically. Uniquely, we conducted in-depth narrative interviews with 30 male meditators in London, United Kingdom, to explore the appeal Buddhism held for them. Buddhism was portrayed as a nexus of ideas and practices that improved men’s lives. Analyzed through the prism of a multidimensional biopsychosocial model of wellbeing, Buddhism appeared to have the potential to promote wellbeing in biological terms (e.g., health behaviors), psychological terms (e.g., generating subjective wellbeing), and social terms (e.g., offering a supportive social network). From a gendered perspective, Buddhism offered men the opportunity to rework their masculine identity in ways that enhanced their wellbeing. This was a complex development, in which traditional masculine norms were upheld (e.g., Buddhism was constructed as a ‘rational’ framework of ideas/practices), yet also challenged (e.g., norms around alcohol abstinence). Our study offers new insights into the hazards and the attractions — particularly for men — of engaging with Buddhism.
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David Graham
Contemporary Jewry, April 2014, Pages 31-57
Abstract:
During the 1990s, Jewish communal leaders in Britain reached a consensus that Jewish education, in the broadest sense, was the principal means of strengthening Jewish identity and securing Jewish continuity. This belief motivated considerable investment in communal intervention programs such as Jewish schools, Israel experience trips, and youth movements. Twenty years on, it is pertinent to ask whether, and to what extent, this intervention has worked. The Institute for Jewish Policy Research’s (JPR) 2011 National Jewish Student Survey contains data on over 900 Jewish students in Britain and presents an opportunity to empirically assess the impact such intervention programs may have had on respondents’ Jewish identity by comparing those who have experienced them with those who have not. Regression analysis is used to test the theory based on a set of six dimensions of Jewish identity generated using principal component analysis. The results show that after controlling for the substantial effects of Jewish upbringing, intervention has collectively had a positive impact on all aspects of Jewish identity examined. The effects are greatest on behavioral and mental aspects of socio-religious identity; they are far weaker at strengthening student community engagement, ethnocentricity, and Jewish values. Further, the most important intervention programs were found to be yeshiva and a gap year in Israel. Both youth movement involvement and Jewish schooling had positive but rather limited effects on Jewish identity, and short-stay Israel tours had no positive measurable effects at all.
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Competition between Judaism and Christianity: Paul's Galatians as Entry Deterrence
Mario Ferrero
Kyklos, May 2014, Pages 204–226
Abstract:
This paper sets forth a theory of competition between exclusive religions as an entry deterrence game, in which the incumbent may find it profitable not to accommodate but to deter the competitor's entry by precommitting to sufficient capacity expansion in the event of entry. If entry costs are high enough, deterrence is optimal and the incumbent remains a monopolist, although the entry threat distorts its effort upward. The model is then used to explain the Jews' withdrawal from proselytism in the face of Christian competition in the first century CE. We review the historical evidence on conversion to Judaism before and after the first century and argue that the demise of Jewish proselytism was due not to the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE but to the apostle Paul's strategic decision, in his letter to the Galatians, that Gentiles need not convert to Judaism to become Christians.
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Family Formation and Religious Service Attendance: Untangling Marital and Parental Effects
Cyrus Schleifer & Mark Chaves
Sociological Methods Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
The positive relationship between family formation and regular weekly religious service attendance is well established, but cross-sectional data make it difficult to be confident that this relationship is causal. Moreover, if the relationship is causal, cross-sectional data make it difficult to disentangle the effects of three distinct family-formation events: marrying, having a child, and having a child who reaches school age. We use three waves of the new General Social Survey panel data to disentangle these separate potential effects. Using random-, fixed-, and hybrid-effect models, we show that, although in cross-section marriage and children predict attendance across individuals, neither leads to increased attendance when looking at individuals who change over time. Having a child who becomes school aged is the only family-formation event that remains associated with increased attendance among individuals who change over time. This suggests that the relationships between marriage and attending and between having a first child (or, for that matter, having several children) and attending are spurious, causal in the other direction, or indirect (since marrying and having a first child make it more likely that one will eventually have a school-age child). Adding a school-age child in the household is the only family-formation event that directly leads to increased attendance.
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Can Religion Insure against Aggregate Shocks to Happiness? The Case of Transition Countries
Olga Popova
Journal of Comparative Economics, forthcoming
Abstract:
This paper examines the effects of reforms and religion on happiness in transition economies. Earlier literature suggests that religiosity insures happiness against various individual stressful life events. This phenomenon is well-explored in developed countries but rarely studied in post-communist countries, where religion was officially suppressed for a long period. These countries have undergone considerable economic transformations over the past two decades. Using cross-sectional Life in Transition Survey data and historical data on religions, I examine if religion insures against economic reforms. The endogeneity of religion is taken into account. The findings suggest that economic reforms may have both positive and negative effects on happiness. Religiosity indeed insures happiness and perceptions of economic and political situations against economic reforms.
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Forgiveness of in-group offenders in Christian congregations
Chelsea Greer et al.
Psychology of Religion and Spirituality, May 2014, Pages 150-161
Abstract:
Religious communities, as other communities, are ripe for interpersonal offenses. We examined the degree to which group identification predicted forgiveness of an in-group offender. We examined the effects of a victim’s perception of his or her religious group identification as a state-specific personal variable on forgiveness by integrating social identity theory into a model of relational spirituality (Davis, Hook, & Worthington, 2008) to help explain victim’s responses to transgressions within a religious context. Data were collected from members of Christian congregations from the Midwest region of the United States (Study 1, N = 63), and college students belonging to Christian congregations (Study 2, N = 376). Regression analyses demonstrated that even after statistically controlling for many religious and transgression-related variables, group identification with a congregation still predicted variance in revenge and benevolence toward an in-group offender after a transgression. In addition, mediation analyses suggest group identification as one mechanism through which trait forgivingness relates to forgiveness of specific offenses. We discuss the importance of group identity in forgiving other in-group members in a religious community.