The Evolution of Religion and Morality by Lang, Martin; Purzycki, Benjamin Grant; Henrich, Joseph;

Short description:

The volume draws on a unique dataset from 15 field sites to answer pressing questions about human religiosity. Building upon the first volume, it presents results from the second phase of Evolution of Religion and Morality project.

Long description:

This volume draws on a unique dataset to answer pressing questions about human religiosity. Building upon the first volume in this series, it presents results from the second phase of the Evolution of Religion and Morality (ERM) project.

The second volume investigates key questions in the evolutionary and cognitive sciences of religion and highlights cultural variability and context specificity of diverse religious systems. Chapters draw on a dataset comprising 2,228 participants from 15 ethnographically diverse societies that stretch from Africa and India through Oceania to South America, and include hunter-gatherers, pastoralists, horticulturalists, subsistence farmers and wage laborers. Four chapters using the full dataset answer the following questions:

• What are the general predictors of commitment to supernatural agents?


• Is there a gender gap in religiosity?


• Does belief in punitive gods facilitates cooperation?


• Are supernatural agents implicitly associated with moral concerns?

Chapters from individual field sites further explore the distinction between moralizing and local gods, the potentially disruptive role of belief in local gods on cooperation with anonymous co-religionists, and the relationship between belief in moralizing gods, cooperation, and differential access to material resources. Above these empirical studies, the book also includes an informed discussion with specialists on the challenges of running such a large cross-cultural project and gives concrete recommendations for future projects.

The Evolution of Religion and Morality: Volume II will be a key resource for scholars and researchers of religious studies, human evolutionary biology, psychology, anthropology, the cultural evolution of religion and the sociology of religion. This book was originally published as a special issue of Religion, Brain & Behavior.

Table of Contents:

Introducing a special issue on phase two of the Evolution of Religion and Morality project1. Material insecurity predicts greater commitment to moralistic and less commitment to local deities: a cross-cultural investigation 2. The religiosity gender gap in 14 diverse societies 3. The moralization bias of gods’ minds: a cross-cultural test 4. When god is watching: dictator game results from the Sursurunga of New Ireland, Papua New Guinea 5. Moralistic and local god beliefs and the extent of prosocial preferences on Tanna Island,Vanuatu 6. Moralizing gods, local gods, and complexity in Hindu god concepts: evidence from South India 7. Cigarettes for the dead: effects of sorcery beliefs on parochial prosociality in Mauritius 8. Perceptions of moralizing agents and cooperative behavior in Northeastern Brazil 9. Prosociality and Pentecostalism in the D.R. Congo 10. Do religious and market-based institutions promote cooperation in Hadza hunter-gatherers? 11. The Evolution of Religion and Morality project: reflections and looking ahead 12. Cultural lessons missed and learnt about religion and culture 13. Two questions for the cultural evolutionary science of religion 14. Big comparison 15. Depth vs. breadth: lessons from the Evolution of Religion and Morality project 16. The Evolution of Religion and Morality project: some modest reservations 17. Guiding the evolution of the evolutionary sciences of religion: a discussion