Shame and Religious Prosociality
Year: 2010
Type: preprint
Abstract: Religious-political entrepreneurs often claim that a more religiously-inspired society will promote ethical and community-minded behavior. Previous work has indeed demonstrated that people in contexts tend to exhibit more prosocial behavior than people in secular contexts. What explains this religious advantage?'' I distinguish between two classes of motivations that may underlie this general finding: a private'' motivation, such as a heightened regard for others' welfare or an awareness of divine observation, and a community-based'' or public motivation, such as the fear of shaming or sanctioning by other people. I test these two mechanisms using a set of experiments in Indonesia in which I vary the anonymity of players and prime some subjects for identity. I find that the Islamic prime elicited strongly heightened generosity by Muslim men, but only when shaming is possible. The results lend support to the community-based view of ethics and show no evidence for a private motivation for the advantage.
Source: SSRN Electronic Journal
Author: Natan B. Sachs
Institution: Stanford University
Language: English
Subfield: Economics and Econometrics
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1525099299