Trust in Others: Does Religion Matter?

Joseph Daniels and Marc von der Ruhr ()

No 902, Working Papers and Research from Marquette University, Center for Global and Economic Studies and Department of Economics

Abstract: Though the recent literature offers intuitively appealing bases for, and evidence of a linkage between religious beliefs, religious participation and economic outcomes, evidence on a relationship between religion and trust is mixed. By allowing for an attendance effect, disaggregating Protestant denominations, and using a more extensive data set, probit models of the General Social Survey (GSS), 1975 through 2000, show that Black Protestants, Pentecostals, fundamentalist Protestants, and Catholics, trust others less than individuals who do not claim a preference for a particular denomination. For conservation denominations the effect of religion is though affiliation not attendance. In contrast, liberal Protestants trust others more and this effect is reinforced by attendance. The impact of religion on moderate Protestants is only through attendance, as frequency of attendance increases trust of others while the denomination effect is insignificant.

Keywords: religion; social trust (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Z12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 30 pages
Date: 2009, Revised 2009-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe, nep-evo and nep-soc
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

Forthcoming in Review of Social Economics

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http://www.busadm.mu.edu/mrq/workingpapers/wpaper0902.pdf First version, 2006, Second version, 2009 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Trust in Others: Does Religion Matter? (2010)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:mrq:wpaper:0902

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