This week was especially short, due to Monday and Thursday off and Wednesday at an NHS meeting. However, I spent what little time I had on making my annotated bibliography. Next week, I must get started on my Proposal. I learned a lot from my research, but I need to clarify what exactly about religion and economics I will be studying, and what I am doing for my final presentation. I want to study how people’s allocation of time is affected by their religious beliefs, and I believe there will be a positive correlation between productive activity and religious belief. I want to conduct my own research as to this, perhaps around Rockford. I also want to do a video essay, a sort of religious and economic episode of Nova. Is this too ambitious? I would love to know your thoughts. I am excited to get started!
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This week, I finished the research articles I received from Dr. Grawe and Dr. Shariff. Out of the articles I read, Johnathan Gruber’s “Religious Market Structure, Religious Participation, and Outcomes: Is Religion Good for You?” proved interesting because it showed the correlation between religiosity and market density. After reading through the research processes and their subsequent conclusions, I have decided to conduct my own study on how religion affects people’s allocation of time. I will look at the similarities and differences between how certain religions affect people’s preferences to spend consumable time versus capital time. Consumable time includes any time that is used for entertainment; nothing that develops spiritual, mental, or physical growth. Capital time is the exact opposite: any time that develops spiritual, mental, or physical growth. It will be difficult to find people to survey, but I am excited to get started.
I have been reading into economic research in the last week. Although the language is proving difficult, I am slowly able to understand the research, and it has given me insight as to how to quantify religion, and how to accurately judge people’s religiosity.
So far, I have read articles that specifically research the relationship between religion and pro-social behavior, anti-social behavior, and economic performance. All of these prove very intriguing, as there is an especially strong correlation between anti-social behavior (crime) and religious belief. A study by A. Shariff and M. Rhemtulla identifies that more belief in hell than heaven in a country (a punishing God) correlated to a smaller crime rate in that country compared to others. Contrarily, more belief in heaven than in hell (a rewarding God) tends to have a higher crime rate than other countries. I also briefly read into the NCAA’s refusal to compete in North Carolina due to the bathroom law; it is highly likely that the economy in North Carolina will suffer as a result of this law, since in their exclusion they have excluded themselves. Although this is interesting, I do not believe this is an issue I would like to tackle at this time. I have determined from my reading that I want to study the relationship between religion and economics on a controlled scale. More specifically, I want to study if and how different religions affect people’s allocations of funds. If I can find a commonality between varying religious people in this way, then I can show how religions are not so very different after all. This week, I was able to contact a number of credible people about my project idea. They all got back to me with plenty of reading material and information. I am truly grateful! My plan is to go through these materials in the coming week.
My next step is to determine exactly how I will be studying and presenting this relationship between economics. Potentially, I could study how people allocate their time (consumable vs. capital) and how that allocations correlates to certain religious practices. Another route is to analyze the costs and benefits of religious participation in American society. Perhaps I could combine the two. I also should start to research religions, and contact religious persons to better understand each culture. However, I feel that I need to first know what exactly about religion I am studying. A big problem I see myself having is the project itself. I have the research, and I will have the study. But how will I present this study? I want to do a video essay, but is that being realistic, or just wishful thinking? I want my presentation to be professional, and I want to focus on the research I have done over the year. I will further look into simple but effective video essays. However, this is something I can decide once I have my baseline research completed, and I know what exactly I will study. If anyone has any ideas about how I should present or approach this research, feel free to comment! This week, I have refined my project to be a cost-benefit analysis of religious participation. I read “God Is Watching You” by Dr. Azim Shariff, a research project that measured the correlation between “God concepts” (ig: prophet, divine, holy) could contribute to how much money they gave to anonymous strangers. The research inspired me to reach out to Dr. Shariff, and explore his research. I have not gotten any reply, but will continue to study his research, as it correlates to my research.
I also had the opportunity to talk to the Economics teacher, Mr. McCoy. He led me to the idea of a cost-benefit analysis. He also gave me a professor to contact about my project at Carleton College. I plan on emailing him in the very near future, to ask for direction on the project. The biggest obstacle in that project is quantifying religious participation. As a completely subjective entity, it will be hard to reconcile with objective economics. Another obstacle is the project itself. I would like to do a video essay, but how can I present that effectively? This is a question I must also address in the coming weeks. McCoy and I discussed a potential for a public survey, studying adults’ beliefs in parallel to their economic choices. This will be difficult to implement, and I am not yet sure if I should study the difference between religions or just the difference between theism and atheism, but I am excited to put it together. I have the foundations of a project; now it is a matter of implementing it. |
Emma Laiis a college senior majoring in Economics (Math Emphasis), Psychology, and Religious Studies. Archives
September 2020
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