The science of religion

Is there an actual relationship between religion and pro-social behavior? Many surveys indicate a direct association between the two, but researchers also say that the relationship emerges most often when concerns over one’s reputation are heightened, researchers report in the Oct. 2 issue of Science. Ara Norenzayan and Azim Shariff have reviewed a long list of experiments aimed at resolving this complex relationship, combining elements of anthropology, sociology, experimental psychology, and experimental economics, to reach their conclusions. In their Review, the authors highlight findings from recent studies that indicate that religious thoughts can reduce rates of cheating, increase trust between strangers, and also that morally-concerned deities within a culture are associated with large group sizes. However, their review also indicates that religion’s association with pro-social behavior is most evident when the situation calls for maintaining a favorable social reputation within the in-group. The researchers caution that more experiments are needed to fully understand the complex relationship, but also suggest that selective pressures over the course of human evolution might someday be able to explain the cross-cultural occurrence, historical persistence, and predictable cognitive structure of religious beliefs and behaviors over time.

ARTICLE #5: "The Origin and Evolution of Religious Prosociality," by A Norenzayan; A.F. Shariff at University of British Columbia in Vancouver, BC, Canada.