Download MORALITY All religions provide moral guidelines: social norms

Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
If we violate norm we accept:
shame, guilt, bad conscience
selfishness, honesty, chastity, greed
norms may also apply to dispositions, e.g.:
social norms – religious norms
All religions provide moral guidelines:
MORALITY
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
main purpose:
maintain group harmony
keeping prosocial and antisocial tendencies in balance
(antisocial, e.g.: self-assertiveness, status seeking)
SOCIAL NORMS:
not killing, not stealing, helping the poor, etc.
similar in different religions,
for example,
ancient Egypt (Book of the dead), Bible, Buddhism,
Nuers (South-Sudan)
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
often:
religious specialists (officers) include norms that
maintain their own status
RELIGIOUS NORMS:
Which god(s) to worship,
which prayers & when, rituals,
religious services, virginity of priests,
killing of people of different faith or heretics
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
instructions for deceased what to answer to the gods in the
procedure of judgment of the dead
mortuary spells -
Example: Book of the Dead
(from 1600 BC on, some spells ca 2600 BC)
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
(British Museum)
Morality
Papyrus (1600 – 1100 BC)
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
I have not added weights to the scales to cheat buyers.
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I have not scorned (blasphemed) any god.
I have not defrauded the poor of their property.
I have not killed.
I have not given order to kill.
I have not inflicted pain on anyone.
I have not stolen the drink left for the gods in the temples.
examples of mortuary spells:
Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
• Social intuist theory of moral judgment
• Biological foundations of morality
- prosocial and antisocial behavior
- reciprocity
- status seeking
- sexuality
- group distinctiveness
• Moral attitudes and religiosity
• Benefits of religion for morality
• Religious morality and general moral norms
PREVIEW
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
Stealing / tell a lie in order to save a life
actually: You shall not kill, except …
(self defense, just war, execution, …)
You shall not kill
• At least some of the social norms are not totally
general, e.g.:
• Many social norms identical to
religious social norms,
e.g., prohibition of killing, stealing, defrauding
Religious morality and general social norms
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
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• Religions may be indifferent to specific social norms
(do not dictate or forbid),
e.g., to death penalty, slavery (also in New testament)
• Some social norms are flexible over time
e.g. regulation of sexual behavior
(pre-, extramarital sex)
respecting the king
• Not all religious norms are social norms
(in all countries):
prohibition of sex before marriage,
religious duties like prayers, etc.
Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
• Many moral principles of many modern states are
not religious norms,
or have even to be enforced against religions
e.g.,
equal rights for men & women
human rights
prohibition of slavery
prohibition of torture
democracy
…
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
Hinduismus: disagreement whether Shiva or Vishnu
is the higher Lord.
According to a holy text,
Shiva’s heaven is promised to a person
who kills someone who blasphemes Shiva,
or tears out his tongue.
(Klostermaier, 1994)
Execution of heretics in Christianity
Examples
• Religious norms may prescribe behavior that is
seen as immoral in other norm systems
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
Islam (Sharia - body of Islamic religious law)
Stoning to death as penalty for married men and
women who commit adultery.
Severe penalties for giving up faith or blasphemy
(also in old testament)
recent examples:
Bible (old testament: Deuteronomy, Leviticus)
death penalty for :
cursing your parents, adultery, homosexuality,
bestiality, etc
A man was gathering sticks for fire on a Sabbath
Moses asked god what to do with that man
God ordered to stone him with stones.
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
Christian-based Ku Klux Klan:
hatred to blacks, jews, catholics
(Dawkins, 2006)
2006: A. Rahman sentenced to death for converting to
Christianity (avoided death because of pleading
insanity and because of international pressure)
2001: Dr. Shaik (medical Dr, lecturer) sentenced to
death for blasphemy (said to students that Prophet
Mohammed was not a Muslim befor he founded
religion at age of 40)
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Morality
Religion is useful to enforce moralic principles:
Punishment (by gods) if moral rules are
disobeyed
Punishment and reward usually in afterlife
but violations may already be punished here
•
Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Religion provides reasons for moral principles
This norm is prescribed by god(s).
(Therefore, it is valid and you have to obey it.)
Especially important, if norms are inherited
(see: Social intuist theory of moral judgment)
•
Benefits of religion for morality
(independent from contents of norms)
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Morality
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Æ People who believe they remain anonymous
are less altruistic, more aggressive, more punitive
than those who believe their identities will be
known
(Diener et al. 1976; Ellison et al., 1995;
war situations: Watson,1973,
Northern Ireland: Silke, 2003)
Helps to control adherence to norms
„gods see everything and can look into your heart“
provides control even if there is no other human
being around
Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
•
Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
e.g., Broad (1925)
Morality
religion should be promoted (even if it is considered as
wrong) in order to keep up morality
Some philosophers:
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
- women going topless on beaches
- heavy metal and rap music
- suicide
- homosexuality
- contraception
- pornography
- divorce
- abortion
in USA, people who are more religious show more
opposition to, for example:
MORAL ATTITUDES & RELIGIOSITY
(see Spilka et al., 20033)
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
- censorship of sex and violence in mass media
- traditional sex roles
- vengeance
- capital punishment
- marriage
Religious people are more likely to support,
for example,
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
- 70% of a sample of young Seventh-Day Adventists
are pro their church’s prohibition of premarital sex,
54% engaged in premarital sex (Ali & Naidoo, 1999)
- people personally opposing abortion on moral or
religious grounds may favor legal abortion
(Scott, 1989)
Problem: Not necessarily attitudes = behavior
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
some few behavioral measures, e.g. Perrin (2000)
mainly questionnaires for honesty
problem of operationalization
little or no correlation
Religiosity and HONESTY (students)
Some specific topics
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
problem: drug use usually measured with
self-reports
also with newer religious movements
vast majority of studies:
weak negative correlation
religiosity – drug use/abuse
DRUGS
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
Sexual “sins” as cause for shame, guilt, fear
Even children of unmarried mothers punished
Up to present, millions of people punished
(Shea, 1992)
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Christianity, Islam and other religions:
restrictions on sexual behavior
premarital sex, adultery, homosexuality, masturbation,
…
SEXUAL BEHAVIOR
Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
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concentration on pre-marital sex of younger people
few studies involving extramarital sex, homosexuality etc.
vast majority of studies:
weak negative correlation
religiosity – nonmarital sex (self-reports mainly)
Nonmarital sex
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36
25
36
40
43
49
55
40
Jewish
Catholic
Episcopalian
Presbyterian
Lutherian
Methodist
Baptist
Other Protestant
Total sample
88
93
90
91
90
89
85
87
75
66
Extramarital
sexuality
Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
79
86
89
84
81
76
66
77
43
49
Homosexuality
Note. Adapted from Cochran and Beeghley (1991), pp. 54-55). After Spilka et al (2003)
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Premarital
Sexuality
Nonaffiliated
Religious group
Attitudes toward Nonmarital Sexuality:
Percentage Saying Specific Behaviors Are „Almost Always Wrong“ or „Always
Wrong“ among Different Religious Groups
Attitude toward:
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
“real/severe” crimes not investigated
Problem: self-reports,
how to operationalize otherwise?
problem: usually additional factors for criminal
behavior – these not taken into account
weak negative correlation mainly for victimless
activities (e.g., drug abuse, premarital consensual
sex), not for other types
CRIMINAL / DELINQUENT BEHAVIOR
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
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quest (flexible, questioning approach to religion)
end (intrinsic)
means (conceptually similar to extrinsic
orientation)
scales with three main dimensions:
also behavioral measures
Batson (number of studies from about 1970 on)
HELPING BEHAVIOR
Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
• quest-scale best predictor for helping behavior
• intrinsic religiosity relates mainly to appearance of
being helpful
general result:
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
theme 2: jobs that students might pursue
theme 1: parable of the good Samaritan
- then (one at a time) 40 of these students came to a
follow-up experimental session
Task: to prepare a short talk based on one of two
themes (theme = independent variable)
- questionnaire that measured religious orientation
(among other things)
67 students
Darley & Batson (1973). “Good Samaritan study”
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
- When helped, this person said he had just taken his
medication, he would be ok in a few minutes
he would like to be left alone
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- On way to other building: students had to pass a person
seemengly in need of help
- Independent variable:
half of the subjects were told they had to hurry because
they were late
- after some minutes of preparation,
subjects were given a map showing room in another
building where they had to go to give the talk
Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
- Quest oriented people did not insist ( r = -.54 )
- Intrinsic oriented people insisted more likely on help
( r =.43 )
(preprogrammed helping style – not affected by needs)
When helped, and being told victim did not want help:
(less help by people in hurry, no effect of theme)
religious scale measures enable no prediction
16 of 40 subjects (40%) offered help
Results
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Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
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Bateson’s interpretation (Intrinsic more egoistic) sometimes
questioned
relatively small samples of students (generalizability?)
correlations often small
Critique:
Quest-orientation: better prediction of helping behavior,
help is more motivated by needs of the helped person
Intrinsic oriented: helpfulness to some extent serves own
needs of helper (more egoistic)
Summary result of Batson’ studies:
Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
two additional measures:
Extrinsic and intrinsic distinction too restricted
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Problem of social desirability as confounding variable
Extrinsic scale positively correlated with prejudice
Intrinsic scale not or weakly negatively correlated
PREJUDICE
Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
authoritarian submission
authoritarian aggression
conventionalism
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Right-Wing Authoritarianism (RWA) (Altenmayer, 1982 etc)
authoritarianism focuses on three attitudinal clusters:
– rigid, dogmatic style of religiousness
Religious Fundamentalism
Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
high RF correlated with high RWA
low Quest scores and high RF scores are positively
correlated to prejudice
In many studies,
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0
7
2
11
Racial/ethnic
groups
Gay/lesbian
persons
RWA
Total
2
0
1
0
0
5
0
1
4
-
8
0
4
3
+
5
0
2
1
0
E
4
2
2
0
-
0
0
0
0
+
8
0
2
3
0
Quest
13
4
7
2
-
44
13
17
5
+
6
0
0
6
0
Psychology of Religous
Beliefs
Morality
35
0
0
0
0
-
Rel.Fundam.
Note: Sixteen studies included, some with multiple samples and/or multiple measures
„+,“ significant positive relationship between religious orientation and intolerance; „0,“ no relationship;
„-,“ significant negative relationship.
Adapted from Hunsberger and Jackson (after Spilka et al)
+
Type of
intolerance
I
Religious orientation measure
Relationships between Four Religious Orientations and Measures of
Intolerance: A Survey of Studies from 1990 to 2003