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Replication Data for: Universal Love or One True Religion? Experimental Evidence of the Ambivalent Effect of Religious Ideas on Altruism and Discrimination

Harvard Dataverse (Africa Rice Center, Bioversity International, CCAFS, CIAT, IFPRI, IRRI and WorldFish)

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Title Replication Data for: Universal Love or One True Religion? Experimental Evidence of the Ambivalent Effect of Religious Ideas on Altruism and Discrimination
 
Identifier https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/VG3UFZ
 
Creator Hoffmann, Lisa
Basedau, Matthias
Gobien, Simone
Prediger, Sebastian
 
Publisher Harvard Dataverse
 
Description Contrary to the expectations of secularization theory, religion remains socially important and affects politics in multiple ways—especially regarding conflict between religious communities. Theoretically, religion can increase altruism, but belief in the superiority of one’s faith may facilitate intergroup discrimination and related conflict. Previous findings remain inconclusive however, as specific religious ideas have hardly been tested. In this paper, we argue that the content of religious ideas has causal effects on intergroup discrimination. We hence test the impact of two opposing, prominent religious ideas on altruism and discrimination: universal love and the notion of one true religion. Conducting dictator games with Christians and Muslims in Ghana and Tanzania, we find causal effects: while the idea of one true religion increases intergroup discrimination, that of universal love fosters equal treatment. The policy implications hereof are obvious: promoting tolerant religious ideas seems crucial to avoiding conflict.



Data has been collected in Accra (Ghana) and Dar es Salaam (Tanzania) by the author and her experimental teams.
 
Subject Social Sciences
Discrimination
Altruism
Religion and conflict
Dictator game
Artefactual field experiment
 
Contributor Hoffmann, Lisa