Origins of Religiousness: The Role of Natural Disasters

Research output: Working paperResearch

Across 800 regions of the World, this research shows that people are more religious when living in regions that are more frequently razed by natural disasters. This is in line with psychological theory stressing that religious people tend to cope with adverse life events by seeking comfort in their religion or searching for a reason for the event; for instance that the event was an act of God. This is termed religious coping. Natural disasters are a source for adverse life events, and thus one way to interpret my findings is by way of religious coping. The results are robust to various measures of religiousness, and to inclusion of country fixed effects, income, education, demographics, religious denominations, and other climatic and geographic features. The results hold within Christianity, Islam and Buddhism, and across continents. To eliminate bias from omitted variables and selection (perhaps religious people are less likely to move out of disaster areas as they see the disaster as an act of God), I further show that second generation immigrants whose mothers descend from natural disaster areas, are more religious than their counterparts with ancestors from calmer areas. Why should economists care? Evidence suggests that religiousness influences economic outcomes (e.g., McCleary & Barro (2003), Iannaccone (1998)).
Original languageEnglish
Place of PublicationKbh.
PublisherØkonomisk institut, Københavns Universitet
Number of pages40
Publication statusPublished - 2013
SeriesUniversity of Copenhagen. Institute of Economics. Discussion Papers (Online)
Number2
Volume13
ISSN1601-2461

ID: 46766033