Religious children are meaner than their secular counterparts, study finds

[TheIrishman]

Religious children are meaner than their secular counterparts, study finds

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/06/religious-children-less-altruistic-secular-kids-study

Children from religious families are less kind and more punitive than those from non-religious households, according to a new study. Academics from seven universities across the world studied Christian, Muslim and non-religious children to test the relationship between religion and morality. They found that religious belief is a negative influence on children's altruism.

"Overall, our findings... contradict the commonsense and popular assumption that children from religious households are more altruistic and kind towards others", said the authors of The Negative Association Between Religiousness and Children's Altruism Across the World, published this week in Current Biology. "More generally, they call into question whether religion is vital for moral development, supporting the idea that secularisation of moral discourse will not reduce human kindness – in fact, it will do just the opposite."

Almost 1,200 children, aged between five and 12, in the US, Canada, China, Jordan, Turkey and South Africa participated in the study. Almost 24% were Christian, 43% Muslim, and 27.6% non-religious. The numbers of Jewish, Buddhist, Hindu, agnostic and other children were too small to be statistically valid. They were asked to choose stickers and then told there were not enough to go round for all children in their school, to see if they would share. They were also shown film of children pushing and bumping one another to gauge their responses.

The findings "robustly demonstrate that children from households identifying as either of the two major world religions (Christianity and Islam) were less altruistic than children from non-religious households". Older children, usually those with a longer exposure to religion, "exhibit[ed] the greatest negative relations".

The study also found that "religiosity affects children's punitive tendencies". Children from religious households "frequently appear to be more judgmental of others' actions", it said. Muslim children judged "interpersonal harm as more mean" than children from Christian families, with non-religious children the least judgmental. Muslim children demanded harsher punishment than those from Christian or non-religious homes. At the same time, the report said that religious parents were more likely than others to consider their children to be "more empathetic and more sensitive to the plight of others".

The report pointed out that 5.8 billion humans, representing 84% of the worldwide population, identify as religious. "While it is generally accepted that religion contours people's moral judgments and pro-social behaviour, the relation between religion and morality is a contentious one", it said.

The report was "a welcome antidote to the presumption that religion is a prerequisite of morality", said Keith Porteus Wood of the UK National Secular Society. "It would be interesting to see further research in this area, but we hope this goes some way to undoing the idea that religious ethics are innately superior to the secular outlook. We suspect that people of all faiths and none share similar ethical principles in their day to day lives, albeit may express them differently depending on their worldview".

According to the respected Pew Research Center, which examines attitudes toward and practices of faith, most people around the world think it is necessary to believe in God to be a moral person. In the US, 53% of adults think that faith in God is necessary to morality, a figure which rose to seven of 10 adults in the Middle East and three-quarters of adults in six African countries surveyed by Pew.

Source: The Guardian

[ridery99]

All religion should be banned and people should be told the true word of God.

[manis]

Children tend to imbibe values taught to them by their parents and elders.
Religion, I believe, is incidental.

[Gronthaing]

Not surprising. Teach kids to be irrational and believe in a judgmental god and that's what happens. They behave that way with others. Teach them to understand others and things around them and they turn out alright. And morals don't need religion. Or a belief in god. People can recognize what morals make sense because they improve their life. Not because they fear punishment from god.

[MakingMoneyHoney]

Not surprising. Teach kids to be irrational and believe in a judgmental god and that's what happens. They behave that way with others. Teach them to understand others and things around them and they turn out alright. And morals don't need religion. Or a belief in god. People can recognize what morals make sense because they improve their life. Not because they fear punishment from god.

It's not either or.

Christians reading the bible know that you are to accept your fellow men and women as children of God. We may not agree with the sins we see being committed, but to be mean to someone because of some perceived wrong doing is completely hypocritical and not Christian. Sadly there are many wolves in sheep's clothing who call themselves Christian and defame the name.

[BADecker]

Well, the Christian kids were nicer to start with. Then they got picked on by the non-Christian kids. God gave the Christian kids the smarts to thwart the meanness of the non-Christian kids, as a protection. Kids are kids. Christian kids are still kids. They often use their God-given extra smarts to carry their meanness further than is necessary to protect themselves from the non-Christian kids. Once they beat up a few non-Christian kids, the non-Christian kids want to find out where they get their strength, and the Christian kids convert them.

Are you non-Christian? Do you have kids you love? Teach your kids to be Christian so that they get extra smarts from God. They'll get picked on, of course, by other non-Christian kids. But their smarts will help them to be able to beat the non-Christian kids just like other Christian kids do.

Do your kids a favor. Make them to be real Christians.

[Buffer Overflow]

Do your kids a favor. Make them to be real Christians.

Care to explain how deceiving kids into turning their backs on God and start worshipping man, is doing them a favor?

[toddtervy]

Yea, and many children now are like little demons or puppets that retarded adults use to get away with crime or spread their propaganda.  Many adults themselves are little more than children as far as their intelligence, morals, and reasoning ability goes.  It's a result of life being too easy, survival of the fittest is removed and we've had what is essentially genetic trash populating the earth for some time.  How about a study showing the effects of children being used by these so-called parents, evil adults, that use their children like tools when they're not busy leeching off them emotionally.

[Lethn]

Do your kids a favor. Make them to be real Christians.

Care to explain how deceiving kids into turning their backs on God and start worshipping man, is doing them a favor?

Adding to that, every fucking time particularly religious parents go around hitting their kids they're basically teaching children that it's okay to teach people bullshit as long as you can back it up with violence and unfortunately that's how our societies have operated for thousands of years, I'm not at all surprised by this study.

[BADecker]

Do your kids a favor. Make them to be real Christians.

Care to explain how deceiving kids into turning their backs on God and start worshipping man, is doing them a favor?

Adding to that, every fucking time particularly religious parents go around hitting their kids they're basically teaching children that it's okay to teach people bullshit as long as you can back it up with violence and unfortunately that's how our societies have operated for thousands of years, I'm not at all surprised by this study.

And parents that don't beat their property once in a while, are opening their property up for beatings in the school of hard knocks of life, later.

Moral parents, who beat their property in love and guidance, only when necessary, are giving their property a gift of correction that will help them (the property) throughout life. The prisons are full of former kids that weren't lovingly beaten as children by their owners in the years of their childhood.

[zenitzz]

All religions are equally silly from a dogma standpoint. Only 2 however are responsible for most of the carnage, genocide, and ethnic cleansing. That is 100% verifiable historical fact. Everything else is relativist pap.

[BADecker]

All religions are equally silly from a dogma standpoint. Only 2 however are responsible for most of the carnage, genocide, and ethnic cleansing. That is 100% verifiable historical fact. Everything else is relativist pap.

They are atheism and agnosticism, of course.   

[BADecker]

All religions are equally silly from a dogma standpoint. Only 2 however are responsible for most of the carnage, genocide, and ethnic cleansing. That is 100% verifiable historical fact. Everything else is relativist pap.

They are atheism and agnosticism, of course.   

Just kidding. Atheists and agnostics aren't smart enough to be able to put a war together, or to fight one, or to protect themselves from one.

[bryant.coleman]

All religions are equally silly from a dogma standpoint. Only 2 however are responsible for most of the carnage, genocide, and ethnic cleansing. That is 100% verifiable historical fact. Everything else is relativist pap.

I agree that two religions are responsible for almost 99.99% of the religious violence committed in the past 1,000 years or so. The result? These two religions have adherents from two-thirds of the world population now. Religions grow using violence, genocide and ethnocide. Those religions, which don't employ these tactics will find themselves sidelined.

[Buffer Overflow]

And parents that don't beat their property once in a while, are opening their property up for beatings in the school of hard knocks of life, later.

Instead of using defenceless children as punch bags as outlet for your latent aggression. Why not encourge them to take up physical sports to increase their self-defense, such as Judo.
Funny old Christians. Always finding a way to justify your violence. 

[Lethn]

And parents that don't beat their property once in a while, are opening their property up for beatings in the school of hard knocks of life, later.

Instead of using defenceless children as punch bags as outlet for your latent aggression. Why not encourge them to take up physical sports to increase their self-defense, such as Judo.
Funny old Christians. Always finding a way to justify your violence.  

This is why I can't truly get along with people like that, it's hypocrisy of the finest order, they preach peace and love and then go around hitting their own children claiming it's good for them, of course, children everywhere are seeing through the hypocrisy because they can always sniff it out at an early age.

I actually remember seeing a good video about an Imam who was talking about a son being arrested for selling Marijuana. Apparently one of the dad's had a son who did it and their son said "Well why is it okay for you to sell alchohol?" even the Imam was saying how hypocritical this was and that they should be setting a better example, first time I'd actually seen someone religious properly redeem themselves slightly.

[BADecker]

And parents that don't beat their property once in a while, are opening their property up for beatings in the school of hard knocks of life, later.

Instead of using defenceless children as punch bags as outlet for your latent aggression. Why not encourge them to take up physical sports to increase their self-defense, such as Judo.
Funny old Christians. Always finding a way to justify your violence.  

This is why I can't truly get along with people like that, it's hypocrisy of the finest order, they preach peace and love and then go around hitting their own children claiming it's good for them, of course, children everywhere are seeing through the hypocrisy because they can always sniff it out at an early age.

I actually remember seeing a good video about an Imam who was talking about a son being arrested for selling Marijuana. Apparently one of the dad's had a son who did it and their son said "Well why is it okay for you to sell alchohol?" even the Imam was saying how hypocritical this was and that they should be setting a better example, first time I'd actually seen someone religious properly redeem themselves slightly.

Well, the kid has a point about marijuana. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_men_are_created_equal:

The quotation "All men are created equal" has been called an "immortal declaration," and "perhaps [the] single phrase" of the American Revolutionary period with the greatest "continuing importance." Thomas Jefferson first used the phrase in the U.S. Declaration of Independence, which he penned in 1776 during the beginning of the American Revolution. It was thereafter quoted and incorporated into speeches by a wide array of substantial figures in American political and social life in the United States. The final form of the phrase was stylized by Benjamin Franklin.

...

Jefferson had written, "We hold these truths to be sacred and un-deniable..." Franklin changed it to, "We hold these truths to be self-evident."

So why is it that some people are created more equal in their ability to allow and dis-allow others in their actions? For the same reason that kids are property. They can't fend for themselves in the real world.

Some kids can and do fend for themselves by age 14. Age 18 is simply a standard age that kids are thought to be adults by. Before that age, they are property of their parents or others.

If you are of the family of government, government can keep all its "kids" as property no matter their age. Stop being a citizen, so that you can be an adult, no longer property of your government. Rather, be a man or a woman. After all, what "greaterness" are government people than you that they have the right to order you around?

[European Central Bank]

Makes sense. They have an innate feeling of superiority over those heathens.

[kydranel]

I noticed this when i was young. But not all kids off course. But the meaner are the religious adult guys.

They always judge you in the outside, like when you have earrings or tattoos.

"Science is a discussion, Religion is a sermon"

But let us not judge them either. We and them have own reasons why we say such.

[Altcoinsupporter]

I noticed this when i was young. But not all kids off course. But the meaner are the religious adult guys.

They always judge you in the outside, like when you have earrings or tattoos.

"Science is a discussion, Religion is a sermon"

But let us not judge them either. We and them have own reasons why we say such.

I noticed this as well but not all kids were this way

Some were somewhat skeptical about how they were raised some don't know any better but that doesn't mean they can change how they preceive the world in their eyes