RESEARCH: The Automatic Activation of Religious Concepts: Implications for Religious Orientations

Wenger, Jay L.

doi:10.1207/s15327582ijpr1402_3

Cited by 40 publications

(31 citation statements)

References 33 publications

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“…Self-regulation need not be a deliberative, effortful process: Much of it occurs in a relatively effortless and automatic fashion (Fitzsimmons & Bargh, 2004). This point is relevant to the present article because religious constructs can be activated outside of awareness (Shariff & Norenzayan, 2007;Wenger, 2003Wenger, , 2004 and thereby influence cognition and behavior-perhaps through the self-regulatory process described presently. We reserve the term self-control for situations in which people engage in behaviors designed to counteract or override a prepotent response (e.g., a behavioral tendency, an emotion, or a motivation), such as assaulting someone who has angered them, resting after a hard day at work instead of painting the kitchen, or playing hooky instead of going to school.…”

Section: Methods and Organization Of The Reviewmentioning

confidence: 91%

“…We hope researchers who test these hypotheses will move beyond cross-sectional studies to longitudinal and experimental studies that can address questions of causality (e.g., Fishbach et al, 2003). With newly developed techniques for manipulating religious cognition in the laboratory (e.g., Shariff & Norenzayan, 2007;Wenger, 2003Wenger, , 2004Wenger, , 2007, experimental studies are eminently feasible.…”

Section: Directions For Future Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Religion, self-regulation, and self-control: Associations, explanations, and implications.

McCullough

Willoughby

2009

Psychological Bulletin

919

773

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Many of the links of religiousness with health, well-being, and social behavior may be due to religion's influences on self-control or self-regulation. Using Carver and Scheier's (1998) theory of self-regulation as a framework for organizing the empirical research, the authors review evidence relevant to 6 propositions: (a) that religion can promote self-control; (b) that religion influences how goals are selected, pursued, and organized; (c) that religion facilitates self-monitoring; (d) that religion fosters the development of self-regulatory strength; (e) that religion prescribes and fosters proficiency in a suite of self-regulatory behaviors; and (f) that some of religion's influences on health, well-being, and social behavior may result from religion's influences on self-control and self-regulation. The authors conclude with suggestions for future research.Keywords: religion, self-control, self-regulation, motivation, personalityReligion is a potent social force. History testifies to religion's ability to focus and coordinate human effort, to create awe and terror, to foster war and peace, to unify social groups, and to galvanize them against each other. In addition to religion's social power, however, religion is a psychological force that can influence the outcomes of individual human lives. Indeed, the range of health-related, behavioral, and social outcomes with which religiousness is associated is both provocative and puzzling.Consider these well-replicated findings. First, religiousness (measured variously as high levels of traditional religious belief; frequent involvement in religious institutions such as churches, synagogues, mosques, and temples; and engagement in religious practices such as reading scripture, worship, and prayer) has a small, positive association with longevity. In a meta-analytic review of 42 independent effect sizes, McCullough, Hoyt, Larson, Koenig, and Thoresen (2000) discovered that people who were highly religious were, on average, 29% more likely to be alive at any given follow-up point than were less religious people (95% confidence interval: 1.20 to 1.39). In a traditional narrative review of studies considered by the authors to be of high quality (e.g., studies with large, representative samples and adequate statistical control of potential confounds), Powell, Shahabi, and Thoresen (2003) likewise concluded that frequent religious service attendance was associated with a 25% reduction in mortality.Studies published after McCullough et al.'s (2000) and Powell et al.'s (2003) reviews have yielded similar conclusions in random samples of U.S. adults (Musick, House, & Williams, 2004); older Mexican Americans (T. D. Hill, Angel, Ellison, & Angel, 2005); and adults in Denmark (la Cour, Avlund, & Schultz-Larsen, 2006), Finland (Teinonen, Vahlberg, Isoaho, & Kivela, 2005), and Taiwan (Yeager et al., 2006). These latter studies have also revealed 25% to 30% reductions in mortality for religiously active people, even after controlling for reasonable sets of potential confounds...

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Section: Methods and Organization Of The Reviewmentioning

confidence: 91%

Section: Directions For Future Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

Religion, self-regulation, and self-control: Associations, explanations, and implications.

McCullough

Willoughby

2009

Psychological Bulletin

919

773

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“…On one hand, automatic category activation has been found to have divergent effects as a function of pre-existing attitudes (e.g., Brown et al, 2003); and the effect priming values shows on consequent choices and behavior depends on whether these values are central to the self-concept (Verplanken & Holland, 2002). Similarly, the nonconscious influence of religious stimulation seems to concern only or mainly religious participants (Weisbuch-Remington et al, 2005;Wenger, 2004), possibly because the latter tend to internalize their beliefs and values, and try to live according to them (Wenger, 2004) or because religious symbols are personally relevant to these participants (Weisbuch-Remington et al, 2005). On the other hand, research on priming also suggests that priming effects often work independently of, or even contrary to pre-existing personal dispositions related to the priming construct (e.g., Gardner, Gabriel, & Lee, 1999).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Second, a few previous studies indicate that religious stimuli presented without participants' awareness may be effective in producing some reactions assumed or known to be in line with religion. Baldwin, Carrell, and Lopez (1990) found differences in self-evaluation following subliminal exposure to a religious image (the Pope), and Wenger (2004) found that participants identify actions expressing religiousness faster after being primed with an appropriate religious category. Thus, we predict that a religion prime should also be efficient in producing prosocial tendencies.…”

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confidence: 99%

Nonconscious influences of religion on prosociality: a priming study

Pichon

Boccato

Saroglou

2007

Euro J Social Psych

250

212

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Past literature on the automaticity of social behavior indicates that priming a concept automatically activates related behavioral schemas. In the two present studies we examined the impact of religion on prosociality. In the first study, we tested the impact of subliminal priming of religious concepts on prosocial behavior intentions. We found a main effect of this priming, moderated by valence: prosocial behavior tendencies were stronger when positive religious words had previously been subliminally primed. In the second study, we examined the accessibility of prosocial concepts, after the supraliminal activation of religion. Indeed, we found that not only were religion-related attributes more accessible when primed, but positive religious primes were also able to activate prosocial concepts. While previous research has shown the religion-prosociality link at the explicit level and in terms of the role of individual religiousness, these results indicate that religious concepts by themselves can nonconsciously activate prosocial behavioral schemas. Copyright # 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.Most psychological theories of religion assume that religion plays an important role on prosocial behavior. Religion as a part of culture helps individuals to face the destructiveness of nature and the dangerousness of people's egoistic impulses (Freud, 1927(Freud, /1961. Saints are persons who, by setting the example of charity, make possible what seems risky, pragmatically speaking, because such charity is in principle against one's own personal interests (James, 1902(James, /1985. Religion implies ideals of generativity and concern for others and for subsequent generations (Erikson, 1963). It further provides specific reinforcements and punishments in order to foster moral, prosocial behavior (Skinner, 1969). From a sociobiological and evolutionary perspective, religion is hypothesized to extend the limits of

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“…On n'en citera que quelques exemples. On peut ainsi penser à la reprise, dans le champ religieux, de l'« automaticité », que nous avons précédemment citée et que nous pensions porteur de bien des censures (Wenger, 2004). On peut également penser à l'application, au même champ, de la notion de marché des lieux et des biens de rationalité, sans doute susceptible de belles mises en place expérimentales (Bankston, 2001(Bankston, , 2003, éventuellement ouvertes sur des données développementales (McCullough, Enders, Brion, Jain, 2005).…”

Section: Psychologie Sociale Et Religion Ou Psychologie Sociale De Launclassified

La psychologie sociale expérimentale de la religion. L'état des lieux

Deconchy¹

2011

Bulletin De Psychologie

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RESEARCH: The Automatic Activation of Religious Concepts: Implications for Religious Orientations

Cited by 40 publications

References 33 publications

Religion, self-regulation, and self-control: Associations, explanations, and implications.

Religion, self-regulation, and self-control: Associations, explanations, and implications.

Nonconscious influences of religion on prosociality: a priming study

La psychologie sociale expérimentale de la religion. L'état des lieux

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