Home About Chat Users Issues Party Candidates Polling Firms Media News Polls Calendar Key Races United States President Senate House Governors International

New User Account
"A comprehensive, collaborative elections resource." 
Email: Password:

  Religious children are meaner than their secular counterparts, study finds
NEWS DETAILS
Parent(s) Issue 
ContributorRP 
Last EditedRP  Nov 07, 2015 03:06pm
Logged 0
CategoryStudy
AuthorHarriet Sherwood
News DateFriday, November 6, 2015 05:10:00 PM UTC0:0
DescriptionReligious belief appears to have negative influence on children’s altruism and judgments of others’ actions even as parents see them as ‘more empathetic’

Children from religious families are less kind and more punitive than those from non-religious households, according to a new study.

Academics from seven universities across the world studied Christian, Muslim and non-religious children to test the relationship between religion and morality.

They found that religious belief is a negative influence on children’s altruism.

“Overall, our findings ... contradict the commonsense and popular assumption that children from religious households are more altruistic and kind towards others,” said the authors of The Negative Association Between Religiousness and Children’s Altruism Across the World, published this week in Current Biology.

“More generally, they call into question whether religion is vital for moral development, supporting the idea that secularisation of moral discourse will not reduce human kindness – in fact, it will do just the opposite.”
Share
ArticleRead Full Article

NEWS
Date Category Headline Article Contributor

DISCUSSION