Deeply religious people may be more likely than secular peers to forgo a small reward now for a larger one later, a study finds.
Researchers offered nearly 300
undergraduates a series of options involving tradeoffs—$50 now or $100
in six months, for example—and asked them questions about how religious
they were and how often they thought about the future.
On average, intensely religious
participants reported thinking about the future more often and were more
likely to wait patiently. From an evolutionary standpoint, the
researchers said, the benefits of patience—in religion, valuing
salvation over immediate pleasure—may help to explain why religion has
flourished despite imposing substantial demands on believers.
"Religious People Discount the Future Less," Evan C.
Carter, Michael E. McCullough, Jungmeen Kim, Carolina Corrales and Adam
Blake, Evolution and Human Behavior (forthcoming)
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