Religious practice and student performance: Evidence from Ramadan fasting

Erik Hornung, Guido Schwerdt and Maurizio Strazzeri

No 16620, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research

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 TIMMS 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 consistent with the hypothesis that a demanding Ramadan during adolescence affects educational performance by facilitating formation of social capital and social identity via increased religious participation and shared experiences among students.

Keywords: Education; Religion; Religious participation; Ramadan; Social identity; Social capital; Pisa; Timms (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I21 J24 O15 Z12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021-10
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://cepr.org/publications/DP16620 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Religious practice and student performance: Evidence from Ramadan fasting (2023)
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:cpr:ceprdp:16620

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
https://cepr.org/publications/DP16620

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research 33 Great Sutton Street, London EC1V 0DX, UK.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CEPR ().