https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/religious-studies/article/what-does-christianity-predict-about-character-improvement-and-does-the-empirical-evidence-back-it-up/9F6E5C0D8C5878A4BB8E80244B576923?utm_id=97757_v0_s00_e0_tv2_a1dennhbdftx5p#article
Quote:Non-malevolence. While compassion has to do with helping, non-malevolence is a virtue concerned with not harming others. Donating to charity would fall under the scope of compassion, whereas something like not assaulting a person would fall under the scope of non-malevolence. Here is some relevant data in this area:
- Those who regularly attended religious services were 25% more likely to give to charity than those who did rarely or said they were not religious (9166 percent). They also were 23% more likely to volunteer (6744 percent). In 2000, they gave away 3.5 times more money per year (2,210642) and volunteered more than twice as much (12 times versus 5.8 times) (Brooks Reference Brooks2006).
- 'In 2002, religious people were far more likely to donate blood than secularists, to give food or money to a homeless person, to return change mistakenly given them by a cashier, and to express empathy for less fortunate people … religious people were 57 percent more likely than secularists to help a homeless person at least once a month' (Brooks Reference Brooks2006, 39).
- Similarly, other studies found that, for instance, over 20% of fundamentalists, evangelicals, mainline, and liberal Protestants self-reported giving away 'a lot' of money to organizations which help the poor in the past two years, whereas only 9.5% of nonreligious respondents did. In general, the latter group was 0.70 times as likely to give to such organizations as religious people were, regardless of what type of religion was subscribed to (Regnerus et al. Reference Regnerus, Smith and Sikkink1998).Footnote21
- In their literature review of 77 studies, Yasin and colleagues found that 'religion measured as group affiliation, values, beliefs, and the importance of faith to the believer, as well as religious service attendance and private prayer most often positively relates with giving to outgroup and secular organizations' (Yasin et al. Reference Yasin, Adams and King2020, 11).Footnote22
Honesty. This virtue covers many behaviours, but here we will just focus on lying (for a detailed study of honesty, see Miller Reference Miller2021). Unfortunately, there are not many studies, but these are a few results:
- Ellison and Anderson found that based on self-reports, men who attend religious services once a week or more are 60.7% less likely than nonattenders to commit domestic violence. Partner reports show a 48.7% decrease (Ellison and Anderson Reference Ellison and Anderson2001).Footnote23
- Johnson and Siegel found that 'the probability of committing a non-drug crime was 39 percent smaller for youth who attended church more than once a week compared to youth who did not attend, and the difference for drug use was found to be 46 percent. Finally, the probability of youth selling drugs was 57 percent smaller among regular church-attendees than non-attendees' (Johnson and Jang Reference Johnson and Jang2010, 119, citing Johnson and Siegel Reference Johnson and Siegel2002).
- Using a large sample of German adolescents, Dirk Baier found that 30% of Muslims versus 18% of Christians self-reported engaging in at least one instance of violent behaviour in the past 12 months (Baier Reference Baier2014, 114). And higher religiosity decreased violence for Christians but not in a statistically significant way for Muslims (Baier Reference Baier2014, 117).
- Religious attendance was correlated with reduced self-reported performance of 43 different crimes (Evans et al. Reference Evans, Cullen, Dunaway and Burton1995). In another study, religiosity was correlated with decreased delinquency using a self-report measure with 35 different delinquent behaviours; indeed the authors found some evidence for reciprocal causation (Johnson et al. Reference Johnson, Jang, Larson and De Li2001, 3536). Other studies also found negative relationships between various measures of religiosity on the one hand and crime and violence on the other (Lipford et al. Reference Lipford, McCormick and Tollison1993; Hull and Bold Reference Hull and Bold1995; Hull Reference Hull2000; Salas-Wright et al. Reference Salas-Wright, Vaughn and Maynard2014).
- A 2001 meta-analysis of 60 studies found 'religious behavior and beliefs exert a significant, moderate deterrent effect on individuals' criminal behavior' (Baier and Wright Reference Baier and Wright2001, 14). A systematic review in 2000 of 40 studies found that 'Religious measures are generally inversely related to deviance, and this is especially true among the most rigorous studies' (Johnson et al. Reference Johnson, De Li, Larson and McCullough2000, 32). In 2010, a review of 270 studies found 'an inverse or beneficial relationship between religion and some measure of crime or delinquency' in 90% of the studies (Johnson and Jang Reference Johnson and Jang2010, 120).
Self-control. This virtue includes acting with moderation and resisting temptation to do something bad or wrong. Here is a quick summary of various trends:Footnote24
- Students at a university in Canada played an economic game with a partner where they could lie to get a bigger financial pay-off for themselves. Students for whom religion was more important tended to lie a bit more (Childs Reference Childs2013). But in another study, this time at a Catholic university in the U.S., overall religiosity, frequency of prayer, and the importance of religion in daily life all increased the odds that a student would send an honest message in a similar situation (Christie Reference Christie2019).
- A study found that undergraduate students at a school in the U.S. who tended to agree with items like 'Lying is no big deal' and 'What people don't know can't hurt them' also tended to be less religious. It was concluded that lying acceptability correlates negatively with religiosity (Oliveira and Levine Reference Oliveira and Levine2008).
- Finally, a study examined counties in the U.S. that were more or less religious. It found that companies in more religious counties tended to be less likely to misrepresent their financial statements, to employ tax sheltering, and to withhold bad news in financial disclosures (Dyreng et al. Reference Dyreng, Mayew and Williams2012).
- Measures of religiosity have been significantly linked to reduced rates of suicide (Stack Reference Stack1983; Donahue Reference Donahue and Benson1995), lower drug use (Gorsuch Reference Gorsuch1995; National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse 2001),Footnote25 increased health care utilization (Schiller and Levin Reference Schiller and Levin1988; Benjamins and Brown Reference Benjamins and Brown2004), reduced smoking (Koenig et al. Reference Koenig, George and Cohen1998; Gillum Reference Gillum2005), reduced alcohol abuse (Clarke et al. Reference Clarke, Beeghley and Cochran1990; Cochran Reference Cochran1993; Koenig et al. Reference Koenig, George, Meador, Blazer and Ford1994; Cochran et al. Reference Cochran, Beeghley and Bock1998), healthier lifestyles (Hill et al. Reference Hill, Ellison, Burdette and Musick2007), the promotion of mental health (Larson et al. Reference Larson, Sherrill, Lyons, Craigie, Thielman, Greenwold and Larson1992; Levin and Chatters Reference Levin, Chatters and Koenig1998),Footnote26 and even mortality rates (Hummer et al. Reference Hummer, Rogers, Nam and Ellison1999).
- For instance, with mortality rates, Hummer and colleagues found that the life expectancy estimates at age 20 were 55.3 years for those who did not attend religious services, compared to 62.9 years for those who attended more than once per week. For African Americans, the difference was 46.160.1 years, respectively (Hummer et al. Reference Hummer, Rogers, Nam and Ellison1999).
- As another example, a 2020 study by Chen and colleagues found that among '66,492 female registered nurses and 43,141 male health care professionals in the US, attendance at religious services at least once per week was associated with a 68% lower hazard of death from despair among women and a 33% lower hazard among men compared with never attendance.'Footnote27 An earlier 2016 study similarly found that among '89,708 women aged 30 to 55 years who participated in the Nurses' Health Study, attendance at religious services once per week or more was associated with an approximately 5-fold lower rate of suicide compared with never attending religious services' (VanderWeele et al. Reference VanderWeele, Li, Tsai and Kawachi2016, 845).