Religious kids vs Secular kids, who's more moral

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Van Hohenheim
http://www.cell.com/current-biology/abstract/S0960-9822(15)01167-7

" Highlights
Family religious identification decreases children's altruistic behaviors

Religiousness predicts parent-reported child sensitivity to injustices and empathy

Children from religious households are harsher in their punitive tendencies"

" Here, we assessed altruism and third-party evaluation of scenarios depicting interpersonal harm in 1,170 children aged between 5 and 12 years in six countries (Canada, China, Jordan, Turkey, USA, and South Africa), the religiousness of their household, and parent-reported child empathy and sensitivity to justice. Across all countries, parents in religious households reported that their children expressed more empathy and sensitivity for justice in everyday life than non-religious parents. However, religiousness was inversely predictive of children's altruism and positively correlated with their punitive tendencies. Together these results reveal the similarity across countries in how religion negatively influences children’s altruism, challenging the view that religiosity facilitates prosocial behavior."


http://www.forbes.com/sites/jvchamary/2015/11/05/religion-morality/

Surtur
It doesn't surprise me. I think those raised by super religious parents come to truly hate the church and everything it stands for. My parents weren't big religious people(church twice a year), but even then I came out of it with a negative view of the religion. So I can only imagine what kids who really had to suffer through a lot of that crap went through.

Digi
This is aligned with the data we have on this for adults, so it shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. We just have to be careful to remember this is statistical data, and that it often won't account for the wild variance that we find at the individual level. If we forget that, it's too easy to become accusatory or needlessly defensive.

Further reading:
http://www.killermovies.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=479017

Highlights from that thread:
Perhaps the biggest myth concerning atheism is that morality becomes an "anything goes" attitude without a god-figure to keep a person in check. For example, a July 1995 poll of 1,007 adults published in George Barna's 1996 Index of Leading Spiritual Indicators found that 60% of Americans believe atheism has a generally negative influence on society. But as it turns out, this hypothesis is testable, and has been tested by numerous credible sources.

- a 1934 study by Abraham Franzblau found a negative correlation between acceptance of religious beliefs and three different measures of honesty.
- In 1950 a survey of thousands was conducted by Murray Ross, and found that those who considered themselves agnostics or atheists were more likely to express willingness to aid the poor than those who considred themselves deeply religious.
- A 1969 report (Hirschi and Stark) that analyzed a multitude of crime and cultural data found no significant different in the likelihood of committing crimes between children who attended church regularly and those who did not.
- A 1975 report (Smith, Wheeler, & Diener) reported no difference in religious/non-religious college-age students when measuring how likely they were to cheat on tests.
- A similar report from 1962 (Middleton & Putney) reports a noticeable increase in cheating among religious students.
- David Wulff's 1991 novel Psychology of Religion compiles dozens of studies to this affect and finds a positive correlation between "religious affiliation, church attendance, doctrinal orthodoxy, rated importance of religion, and so on" with "ethnocentrism, authoritarianism, dogmatism, social distance, intolerance of ambiguity, and specific forms of prejudice, especially against Jews and blacks" (219-220).

To my knowledge, none of the researchers cited are atheists. All are researchable for those who wish to see the exact methods and results. It does not prove that atheism or spirituality makes one more moral than the other, but it shows irrefutable evidence that not only that atheism can be moral, but most atheists are moral. But the data is clear: not only does religion not ensure a heightened morality over non-religion, but it is statistically correlated with higher occurrences of immorality.

Bentley
Kids are evil thumb up

The MISTER
Originally posted by Bentley
Kids are evil thumb up Fact.

NewGuy01
What a ridiculous question. It depends on the kids as individuals.

Emperordmb
Originally posted by NewGuy01
What a ridiculous question. It depends on the kids as individuals.

Van Hohenheim
Originally posted by NewGuy01
What a ridiculous question. It depends on the kids as individuals.
Did you read the original post?

Stigma
Originally posted by NewGuy01
What a ridiculous question. It depends on the kids as individuals.
thumb up

Originally posted by Surtur
It doesn't surprise me. I think those raised by super religious parents come to truly hate the church and everything it stands for. My parents weren't big religious people(church twice a year), but even then I came out of it with a negative view of the religion. So I can only imagine what kids who really had to suffer through a lot of that crap went through.
That's surprising as most people my age in Poland are moderately religious, with some little groups on either side of the spectrum. (non-religious and very religious).

It's certiuanly not unsual to see dozens of twenty-somethings in a Church.

Greatest I am
Originally posted by Bentley
Kids are evil thumb up

Yes but religious ones have more negative biases than non-religious kids.

Here is just one example.

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=d04_1452631143

Regards
DL

Greatest I am
Originally posted by NewGuy01
What a ridiculous question. It depends on the kids as individuals.

Exactly right but to ignore the statistics is even more ridiculous and only those who do not want to improve on all of society will ignore them in their decision making..

Regards
DL

Surtur
Originally posted by Stigma
That's surprising as most people my age in Poland are moderately religious, with some little groups on either side of the spectrum. (non-religious and very religious).

It's certiuanly not unsual to see dozens of twenty-somethings in a Church.

I'm guessing it depends on one's own experience with religion. For my experience it was more of a chore. I've seen religious people do some messed up things, and heard them say some messed up things. Though when I say I've seen them do messed up things I am not talking about some kind of "priest molesting little kids" type of stuff. I more-so saw emotional abuse disguised as teaching.

Of course I was forced to go to a catholic grammar school and catholic high school, the latter of which was boys only. Just dudes man, dudes all the time. Everywhere you turn, dudes..all wearing the *exact* same clothes. Who wants to go to a school like that?!

Fated Xtasy
T'is Most interesting.

Yet I'd add that the child's mind and ideas are warped by the people, culture, friends, and faiths around him. A child with strict parents would either become a firm sheep like his parents, and a child with less devout parents would become more lax in his approach of religion.

Interestingly, while t'is this that is usually the norm, it can add times be quite opposite. Some children or people with no real connection to a god would likely, if a bit rarely, seek out a religion, while religious people would obviously wish to break free of their "binds".

That said, children with devout parents can too be lax in what they believe, but by the time of their teenage years they'll like delve into recreational drugs and alcohol to cope with the ideal facade they feel they must keep.

We are shaped by the people around us, and what we learn. One cannot expect every situation to be the exact same.

Van Hohenheim
Originally posted by Fated Xtasy
T'is Most interesting.

Yet I'd add that the child's mind and ideas are warped by the people, culture, friends, and faiths around him. A child with strict parents would either become a firm sheep like his parents, and a child with less devout parents would become more lax in his approach of religion.

Interestingly, while t'is this that is usually the norm, it can add times be quite opposite. Some children or people with no real connection to a god would likely, if a bit rarely, seek out a religion, while religious people would obviously wish to break free of their "binds".

That said, children with devout parents can too be lax in what they believe, but by the time of their teenage years they'll like delve into recreational drugs and alcohol to cope with the ideal facade they feel they must keep.

We are shaped by the people around us, and what we learn. One cannot expect every situation to be the exact same.
Do sheep gather with pride? It's safe to say that most kids are influenced by the environment their parents want.

riv6672
Hmm.

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