The economics of faith: using an apocalyptic prophecy to elicit religious beliefs in the field

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Augenblick, Ned; Cunha, Jesse M.; Dal Bo, Ernesto; Rao, Justin M.
• 署名单位: University of California System; University of California Berkeley; United States Department of Defense; United States Navy; Naval Postgraduate School; National Bureau of Economic Research; Microsoft
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF PUBLIC ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0047-2727
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2016.07.004
• 发表日期: 2016
• 页码: 38-49
• 关键词: Economics of faith; religion; FAITH; time preference; beliefs; field experiments

摘要

We model religious faith as a demand for beliefs, following the logic of the Pascalian wager. We show how standard experimental interventions linking financial consequences to falsifiable religious statements can elicit and characterize beliefs. We implemented this approach with members of a group that expected the End of the World to occur on May 21, 2011 by varying monetary prizes payable before and after May 21st. To our knowledge, this is the first incentivized elicitation of religious beliefs ever conducted. The results suggest that the members held extreme, sincere beliefs that were unresponsive to experimental manipulations in price. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.