Highly Religious People Are Less Motivated by Compassion Than Are Non-Believers

[Dawk]

This study just goes to show that the higher rates of charitable donations and volunteer work by religious people are more a result of the Churches' near monopoly on charitable institutions and their desire to control impressionable minds. With these findings, we have every reason to be optimistic about future successes of secular alternatives such as UNICEF and Non-Believers Giving Aid.

ScienceDaily (Apr. 30, 2012) — "Love thy neighbor" is preached from many a pulpit. But new research from the University of California, Berkeley, suggests that the highly religious are less motivated by compassion when helping a stranger than are atheists, agnostics and less religious people.

In three experiments, social scientists found that compassion consistently drove less religious people to be more generous. For highly religious people, however, compassion was largely unrelated to how generous they were, according to the findings which are published in the most recent online issue of the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science.

The results challenge a widespread assumption that acts of generosity and charity are largely driven by feelings of empathy and compassion, researchers said. In the study, the link between compassion and generosity was found to be stronger for those who identified as being non-religious or less religious.

"Overall, we find that for less religious people, the strength of their emotional connection to another person is critical to whether they will help that person or not," said UC Berkeley social psychologist Robb Willer, a co-author of the study. "The more religious, on the other hand, may ground their generosity less in emotion, and more in other factors such as doctrine, a communal identity, or reputational concerns."

Compassion is defined in the study as an emotion felt when people see the suffering of others which then motivates them to help, often at a personal risk or cost.

While the study examined the link between religion, compassion and generosity, it did not directly examine the reasons for why highly religious people are less compelled by compassion to help others. However, researchers hypothesize that deeply religious people may be more strongly guided by a sense of moral obligation than their more non-religious counterparts.

"We hypothesized that religion would change how compassion impacts generous behavior," said study lead author Laura Saslow, who conducted the research as a doctoral student at UC Berkeley.

Saslow, who is now a postdoctoral scholar at UC San Francisco, said she was inspired to examine this question after an altruistic, nonreligious friend lamented that he had only donated to earthquake recovery efforts in Haiti after watching an emotionally stirring video of a woman being saved from the rubble, not because of a logical understanding that help was needed.

"I was interested to find that this experience -- an atheist being strongly influenced by his emotions to show generosity to strangers -- was replicated in three large, systematic studies," Saslow said.

In the first experiment, researchers analyzed data from a 2004 national survey of more than 1,300 American adults. Those who agreed with such statements as "When I see someone being taken advantage of, I feel kind of protective towards them" were also more inclined to show generosity in random acts of kindness, such as loaning out belongings and offering a seat on a crowded bus or train, researchers found.

When they looked into how much compassion motivated participants to be charitable in such ways as giving money or food to a homeless person, non-believers and those who rated low in religiosity came out ahead: "These findings indicate that although compassion is associated with pro-sociality among both less religious and more religious individuals, this relationship is particularly robust for less religious individuals," the study found.

In the second experiment, 101 American adults watched one of two brief videos, a neutral video or a heartrending one, which showed portraits of children afflicted by poverty. Next, they were each given 10 "lab dollars" and directed to give any amount of that money to a stranger. The least religious participants appeared to be motivated by the emotionally charged video to give more of their money to a stranger.

"The compassion-inducing video had a big effect on their generosity," Willer said. "But it did not significantly change the generosity of more religious participants."

In the final experiment, more than 200 college students were asked to report how compassionate they felt at that moment. They then played "economic trust games" in which they were given money to share -- or not -- with a stranger. In one round, they were told that another person playing the game had given a portion of their money to them, and that they were free to reward them by giving back some of the money, which had since doubled in amount.

Those who scored low on the religiosity scale, and high on momentary compassion, were more inclined to share their winnings with strangers than other participants in the study.

"Overall, this research suggests that although less religious people tend to be less trusted in the U.S., when feeling compassionate, they may actually be more inclined to help their fellow citizens than more religious people," Willer said.

In addition to Saslow and Willer, other co-authors of the study are UC Berkeley psychologists Dacher Keltner, Matthew Feinberg and Paul Piff; Katharine Clark at the University of Colorado, Boulder; and Sarina Saturn at Oregon State University.

The study was funded by grants from UC Berkeley's Greater Good Science Center, UC Berkeley's Center for the Economics and Demography of Aging, and the Metanexus Institute.

[Inedifix]

Yes, I'd seen this report. Very interesting. Quite a few strong faith based charities make a point of asking their donors to give, 'because Jesus/God would want you to', whereas the accepted best practice in fundraising is to ask donors to give based on actually helping the ultimate beneficiary.

[Homosapien]

I wasn't surprised by the results.

When in India, I learnt of the caste system in which Hindus believe that the poor people ('untouchables') are in their positions, due to religious fate. And, I have also often heard, "Ohh. It was gods 'Will' that it happened. He did it for a reason."

If it was so called 'gods will', why should they care?! And if they did, couldn't that be seen as, 'Questioning gods Will, and Divine Plan'?! Could they then also be seen as Lacking 'Faith' in gods Divineness?!

Psychological conflict leading to Apathy, comes to my mind. (Unless 'ordered' by a Superior, to be otherwise)

[the_gelf]

Originally Posted by Homosapien

I wasn't surprised by the results.

When in India, I learnt of the caste system in which Hindus believe that the poor people ('untouchables') are in their positions, due to religious fate. And, I have also often heard, "Ohh. It was gods 'Will' that it happened. He did it for a reason."

If it was so called 'gods will', why should they care?! And if they did, couldn't that be seen as, 'Questioning gods Will, and Divine Plan'?! Could they then also be seen as Lacking 'Faith' in gods Divineness?!

Psychological conflict leading to Apathy, comes to my mind. (Unless 'ordered' by a Superior, to be otherwise)

Some of the Perth atheists attended a meetup last Rhursday with a atheist/hindu/xtian panel, (bit of Q&A, but desperately short @ 45min schedule).

The hindu guy made a comment on 'karma', whereupon I was desperately compelled (unfortunately, no time) to ask the "how does your definition of Karma justify the widespread poverty and illiteracy throughout the world"

over 5billion live on <$10day http://www.globalissues.org/article/...acts-and-stats

World Literacy only 82% (1 billion completely illiterate in 2005) http://world.bymap.org/LiteracyRates.html

I have an indian friend who hailed from the highest caste (he lives in Sydney) and polar opposite to the above attitude - he hates the special treatment/attention he receives, just because his name is associated with the Brahmin

On topic (a little more)
I think the lack of compassion boils down to not recognising the world consists of 6.7billion, not 300 million. Or even further, not even outside the immediate numbero f people known (hence the observation of discompassion shown to strangers). The western 'religieux' seem to have this limited perception - I imagine it is the same in other cultures, perhaps even worse.