CALIFORNIA, United States, A new research has reportedly suggests that religious people are willing to take risks because they believe God will protect them from harm.
The Stanford University study, published in the journal of the Association for Psychological Science, contradicts earlier research that suggested that religious people were risk averse.
While previous studies have indicated that religious people are less likely to engage in risky behaviours such as gambling or taking drugs, the Stanford team noted that the risks examined in these earlier studies tended to share a negative moral component.
The researchers, led by Daniella Kupor of Stanford’s Graduate School of Business, hypothesised that thinking about God may have a different effect in relation to risks that have no moral connotation, such as doing a bungee jump, since people tend to view God as a source of protection and security.
They went on to investigate by issuing online surveys to about 900 people and found that those who were reminded of God, either by reading about God or working on word scrambles that included God-related words, were more willing to take risks than those who weren’t prompted to think about religion.
In one study, the scientists posted variations of three advertisements online and recorded the click-through rates for each.
Some of the commercials promoted a non-moral risk, such as “find skydiving near you,” others promoted an immoral risk, such as “learn how to bribe,” and others promoted no risk, such as “find amazing video games.”
Some of the advertisements mentioned God, for example: “God knows what you’re missing! Find skydiving near you.”
The findings revealed that when the adverts included a religious reference, people clicked on the non-moral risk of skydiving, more often.
They nevertheless clicked on the moral risk of bribing less often.
People clicked about the same number of times on the no-risk computer games advert, with or without a mention of God.
“We were surprised to find that even a simple colloquial expression: ‘God knows what you’re missing,’ influences whether people click on a real online ad that is promoting a risky behaviour,” Kupor said.
In another study, participants were asked to choose which version of the study they wanted to complete.
One version would give them a small bonus payment, but involved looking at an “extremely bright colour” that they were told could potentially damage their eyes, while the other version involved looking at a harmless darker colour.
The scientists found that participants who had been reminded of God before making their choice were more likely to opt for the dangerous version of the experiment (96 percent) than those who had not been reminded of God (84 percent).
The research also suggested that people who were reminded of God perceived less danger in various risky behaviours than other participants.
