Religious practice and student performance: Evidence from Ramadan fasting

Erik Hornung, Guido Schwerdt and Maurizio Strazzeri

Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 2023, vol. 205, issue C, 100-119

Abstract: We investigate how the intensity of Ramadan affects educational outcomes by exploiting spatio-temporal variation in annual fasting hours. Longer fasting hours are related to increases in student performance in a panel of TIMSS test scores (1995–2019) across Muslim countries but not other countries. Results are confirmed in a panel of PISA test scores (2003–2018) allowing within country-wave comparisons of Muslim to non-Muslim students across Europe. We provide evidence that a demanding Ramadan affects PISA test scores of Muslim students only in cohorts with a large share of co-religionists. This finding is consistent with the hypothesis that shared experiences during more intensive Ramadans facilitate the formation of social capital and a social identity conducive to learning outcomes.

Keywords: Education; Religion; Religious participation; Ramadan; Social identity; Social capital; PISA; TIMSS (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I21 J24 O15 Z12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167268122003766
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
Working Paper: Religious Practice and Student Performance: Evidence from Ramadan Fasting (2021)
Working Paper: Religious Practice and Student Performance: Evidence from Ramadan Fasting (2021)
Working Paper: Religious practice and student performance: Evidence from Ramadan fasting (2021)
Working Paper: Religious practice and student performance: Evidence from Ramadan fasting (2021)
Working Paper: Religious Practice and Student Performance: Evidence from Ramadan Fasting (2021)
Working Paper: Religious practice and student performance: Evidence from Ramadan fasting (2021)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jeborg:v:205:y:2023:i:c:p:100-119

DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2022.10.025

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization is currently edited by Houser, D. and Puzzello, D.

More articles in Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().